Venice fest: Barbera says no to requests to exclude artists

Published 3 months, 2 weeks ago

Venice Film Festival Director Alberto Barbera on Wednesday rejected calls from the Venice4Gaza group to exclude artists accused of “supporting genocide” in Gaza.

Venice Film Festival Director Alberto Barbera. (Photo: ANSA)

His comments came after Israeli actress Gal Gadot and Scottish actor Gerard Butler withdrew from the event following the group’s campaign against them.

Addressing requests for the festival to take a political stance, Barbera said:
“Our position is that, on the one hand, we are Italy’s leading cultural institution, a place of openness, discussion and debate, which does not exercise any form of censorship against anyone.”

“For this reason, we reject the request to exclude artists who wish to attend the festival,” he continued.

“On the other hand, we have never hesitated to clearly express and declare our deep anguish at what is happening in Gaza and Palestine.”

Barbera was speaking while introducing the festival juries, led by Sideways director Alexander Payne, ahead of the opening night featuring Paolo Sorrentino’s latest film La Grazia and a career Golden Lion for German filmmaker Werner Herzog.

ANSA

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