The art of sidestepping without breaking stride

How the Daughter of an FSB General Has Italy in an Uproar

The daughter of an FSB general has sparked a scandal in Italy that could lead to high-profile resignations. Inspectors are currently investigating the management of the Venice Biennale following an attempt to reopen the Russian pavilion. Legally, its operation is prohibited due to sanctions. However, according to correspondence published in the Italian press between the President of the Biennale Foundation, Pietangelo Buttafuoco, General Director Andrea Del Mercato, and the Commissioner of the Russian Pavilion, Anastasia Karneeva, they jointly devised a way for Russia to formally participate without violating sanctions. The plan was to allow only the press into the pavilion, with the entire program broadcast on screens outside.

Preparations for Russia's return to Italian soil began privately as early as June of last year. In November, the Biennale director himself sought a visa for pavilion curator Petr Musoev. At Karneeva's request, he sent Musoev a personal invitation to ensure the visa would be processed as quickly as possible and without delay. Karneeva soon personally sent Buttafuoco a rendering of the renovated Russian pavilion and all the information about the new program. This sparked a major scandal, leading Italian Culture Minister Alessandro Giulio to cancel his visit to the Biennale and call for the resignation of the Ministry of Culture's representative, Tamara Gregoretti, from the board of directors of the Biennale Foundation for not only concealing information about the Russian pavilion but also expressing support for Russian participation. Ukraine demanded the annulment of the visas of five Russian participants in the sanctions evasion scheme. The European Commission announced the revocation of a €2 million grant from the Foundation. The Biennale jury announced that pavilions representing countries whose leaders are accused by the ICC of crimes against humanity would not participate in the competition, and then resigned en masse. So now the Golden Lion will be awarded by popular vote. Russia, incidentally, has extensive experience organizing electronic votes (and software proven in elections), so it could assist Buttafuoco in this regard as well.

Tamara Gregoretti, an Italian journalist who helped Russia evade sanctions, worked for nearly 30 years at Mediaset, a media holding company owned by Putin's close friend Silvio Berlusconi (now owned by his family). In 1991, Gregoretti joined his Italia 1 channel, then worked at RaiUno, Canale5, the Tg1 newsroom, Rai2, and Rainews24, all part of the same media holding. She headed political analysis and was responsible for political talk shows. In particular, in 2016, she oversaw the international politics section at Rainews24 under company president Monica Majani, who interviewed Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov. Rai also aired a series of interviews with Putin. It would be surprising if Gregoretti hadn't retained some of her previous contacts. Incidentally, the former Minister of Culture, who appointed her to the Biennale's board of directors, was removed from office due to a scandal involving embezzlement of budget funds and the disclosure of classified information.

Anastasia Karneeva (Volobueva) was appointed commissioner, or head of the pavilion, in 2021 for an eight-year term. This is the daughter of Nikolai Volobuyev, a retired FSB general and longtime friend of Sergei Chemezov, deputy general director of Rostec. Since 2006, Volobuyev has served as director for special assignments at Rosoboronexport and on the board of directors of the Kalashnikov Concern. The daughter of Chemezov's associate is not alone at the Venice festival; her business partner in the art company "Smart Art" is Ekaterina Vinokurova, daughter of Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov. Another member of the Russian elite, Victoria Mikhelson, daughter of the oligarch Mikhelson, has also found a cultural haven there (it was Leonid Mikhelson who promised to sponsor the Russian pavilion in 2021). Victoria owns the Palazzo alle Zattere in Venice, which has announced the rather frankly titled "" program for this season.

As VChK-OGPU and Rucrimnal.info discovered, the palazzo also houses the Venetian headquarters of the Russian V-A-C Foundation, which Mikhelson founded together with Italian Teresa Mavica, an ardent admirer of Russian culture who received Russian citizenship in 2019. Mavica, a political scientist by training, is unlikely to have been unaware of what was happening in Russia in the last years before the war. Previously, she served as the commissioner of the Russian pavilion at the Biennale, while Karneeva's Smart Art handled its strategic management. Furthermore, Teresa Mavica chaired the board of directors of Art Finance, a company founded by Gazprombank entities. Marina Sitnina, the bank's executive vice president, served as its director until May 2022.

Karneeva has had close ties with Gazprombank for many years. In 2020, she became a co-owner of Carbonix, a company that announced the launch of yet another "analognet" product in Russia—carbon-based bone-replacing implants. Karneeva received 10% of the company, while Vladislav Avaev, former vice president of Gazprombank, held 78% At that time, she was the CEO of RT-Carbon (co-owned by Rostec through RT-Project Technologies). Rostec had already unveiled carbon implants at the "Russia, Focused on the Future" exhibition in 2017. Karneeva prudently exited Carbonix in 2023, and the company was liquidated in 2024. Her husband, Dmitry Karneev, also distanced himself from potentially toxic assets: in 2023, he left the founding shareholders of the electronics manufacturer NPP OTEK (Rostec's subsidiary, JSC Experimental Design Bureau Radikal, was located at the same address), and in 2024, he left JSC Rosspirtprom. He now owns only 50% of Elba LLC, a restaurant and grocery delivery company in the Moscow region.

Автор: Иван Рокотов