Russia should not be welcome at the world’s top art show

You hop off the vaporetto or stroll along the embankment from St Mark’s Square, away from the gondolas and the Bridge of Sighs. The pavilions of the Venice Biennale, the world’s leading contemporary-art exhibition, are scattered across the lush, jasmine-scented gardens at the island’s eastern tip. This is bliss, culture vultures may think. Yet even in this artistic Arcadia, death and politics intrude. As Vladimir Putin’s war grinds on, a row has erupted in Venice about art, politics and violence.

Ever since the onslaught on Ukraine in 2022, cultural institutions have tried to distance themselves from Russian artists deemed tainted by the bloodshed. In the early months some panicky impresarios went too far, cutting loose critics of Mr Putin as well as cronies. A saner approach has since evolved: blameless and apolitical Russians tend no longer to be blacklisted, but organs and cheerleaders of the renegade state are still shunned. Or, they were until the Venice Biennale revealed that Russia would be exhibiting at the festival that opens in May.

This is a reversal. Aghast at the invasion, in 2022 the artists due to represent Russia at the biannual art jamboree pulled out; a monument built of sandbags kept Ukraine’s plight in mind. Russia was not represented in 2024 either. But this year it will return, say the organisers—news that has outraged Ukrainians and diplomats across Europe. Three arguments are made for the country’s inclusion. All are bad.

The first is the hoary idea that art is above politics. Made by both naive aesthetes and whitewashing cynics, this claim is either a delusion, a cop-out or a lie. For instance, the biennale is avowedly “a place of dialogue, openness and artistic freedom”. Dialogue, openness and freedom are as political as it gets. They certainly are in Russia, which in wartime has locked up a playwright and a director and chased other artists into exile. “No one can deprive Russia of the right to artistic self-expression,” smirked a Russian cultural dignitary of the biennale. False: the Kremlin does that all the time.

The biennale itself—dubbed the Olympics of contemporary art—is grounded in politics. Countries select artists to represent them; the pavilions in those idyllic gardens, in which much of the work is displayed, are owned by participating states. (Russia’s was designed by the architect of Lenin’s mausoleum.) One of the Russian show’s overseers is the foreign minister’s daughter. In recent years much of the assembled art has been stridently political, often dealing with oppression or colonialism of one kind or another.

Another pro-Russian argument is time. Surely, this case runs, no country can be ostracised for ever. Here the hideous news rhythm of war kicks in. The longer it lasts, the more the world’s attention wanders—even as the suffering in Ukraine intensifies—and the more it is eclipsed by other woes. Russia may have started the fighting, inattentive people conclude, but both sides may be to blame for not ending it. And, anyway, what has cutting ties with Russia really achieved?

This argument appeals to some self-serving Western politicians and businessmen. It helps explain why, creepingly, Russian teams are being readmitted to major sports events. But it is wrong. For ever is indeed a long time; it is true that no country should be an eternal pariah. While Russia murders civilians in their beds, however, its rulers and their proxies should be unwelcome.

A last justification is a version of the “whataboutery” beloved of Soviet propagandists. Other strongmen are waging wars; shouldn’t artists from their countries be excluded from Venice too? There is, in fact, a separate push to expel Israel from the biennale, on account of its allegedly genocidal treatment of the Palestinians. An open letter to that effect was signed by almost 200 artists and workers involved in the festival. And what about America, or Ethiopia, or…?

That defence doesn’t stack up either. Wherever you draw the line, Russia—whose army, among its other crimes, loots and destroys Ukrainian libraries, theatres and museums—should fall on the disqualified side of it. No one invites a serial killer to their garden party.

Individual countries, not the biennale, are in charge of their pavilions, note the organisers. Hmm: surely they could, say, omit Russia from catalogues and marketing bumf if they chose to. They deplore censorship and extol free speech. As things stand, they will host quite a lot of it, in the form of boycotts and protests. There will be no escape from war and politics, even in Arcadia. ■