Russian Pavilion artists withdraw from Venice Biennale
VENICE – The curator and two artists due to represent Russia at the 59th International Venice Biennale have decided not to partake, saying, "there is no place for art when Ukrainian civilians are dying under missile fire," cultural sources said.
One of the Russian artists, Kirill Savchenkov, published a statement on social media that said, “there is no place for art when civilians are dying under the fire of missiles, when citizens of Ukraine are hiding in shelters, when Russian protesters are getting silenced. As a Russian-born I won’t be presenting my work at the Venice Biennale.”
The curator of this year’s Russian pavilion was Lithuanian-born Raimundas Malasauskas, who thanked his Russian artist colleagues, Savchenkov and Alexandra Sukhareva, but said, “I cannot advance on working on this project in light of Russia’s military invasion and bombing of Ukraine. This war is politically and emotionally unbearable.”
Malasauskas explained that he was born and raised in Lithuania when it was part of the Soviet Union, and that after it dissolved in 1989 he had watched and enjoyed seeing his country’s development ever since.
“The idea of going back to or forward with living under a Russian or any other empire is simply intolerable.”
The decision by the group marks a clear stance of protest against the war. The chairman of the Venice Biennale Roberto Cicutto released a statement expressing "full solidarity for this courageous and noble act and shares the reasons that led to this choice, which dramatically depicts the tragedy in which the entire population of Ukraine.”
“The Biennale remains a meeting place between people through the arts and culture and condemns those who violently prevent peaceful dialogue,” the statement concluded.
The closure of the Russian pavilion comes as the Ukrainian pavilion at the Biennale is also in question. The artist Pavlo Makov and curators Lizaveta German, Maira Lanko and Borys Filonenko said that they hoped to be able to set up the pavilion, but that due to the invasion they may be "unable to continue working on the project due to the danger to our lives.”
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