“As members of the East Europe Biennial Alliance, we express our heartfelt solidarity with our partner, the Kyiv Biennial, and the people directly affected by the war in Ukraine. We firmly condemn the ongoing invasion led by the Russian regime, exercised with support from the regime of Belarus.
We urge our international community to support Ukrainian people, refugees, and others living in and coming from Ukraine, and raise their voices locally and internationally, speaking up to politicians and decision-makers at different levels. We urge you to publicly acknowledge the aggression and condemn the war, as the ongoing invasion leads to more actual lives and livelihoods being lost every day.
We call for the boycott of, and ceasing of collaboration with, Russian and Belarusian state or oligarchic art structures, including regime-related art foundations, institutions, and galleries.
We stand with our allies across borders who step up against the war in Ukraine and wars and invasions elsewhere. We stand for building and maintaining alternative geopolitical alliances.
In the last days we have seen unprecedented solidarity and support from organizations and individuals. We urge all international art institutions to act as well—taking concrete steps to provide funds, resources, opportunities, residency spaces to artists and art workers in and from Ukraine. They need our support urgently and will need it in the future.
We encourage Russian and Belarusian people, artists, and activists to stand against the criminal regime, to participate in the protests and make your position public, to stop the war by all means!”
East Europe Biennial Alliance comprises Biennale Matter of Art Prague, Biennale Warszawa, Kyiv Biennial, OFF-Biennale Budapest, and Survival Kit Festival Riga. This statement is issued together with Work Hard! Play Hard! Working group (Minsk, Belarus).
