Russian culture is an inseparable part of European history, Italian President Sergio Mattarella said in an interview with Corriere Della Sera on Friday. The leader condemned the recent attempts to cancel Russian works of art amid Moscow’s conflict with Kiev.
Asked if it is “right to abolish” Russian literature and art from Europe’s long cultural history, Mattarella stated that the ‘cancel culture’ against everything Russian is a mistake.
“The attitude towards the cultures produced by man, by the most diverse intellectuals and artists, can only be openness, curiosity, knowledge, comparison,” he said.
Progress comes from this. Not from rejection, not from cancelation.
“The cancel culture towards Russian literature and art is a mistaken gesture,” the president said, adding that Russian culture is an inseparable part of European history.
Mattarella stressed that culture does not lend itself to “convenient cataloging,” and aspires to offer itself as a vision that contrasts with the real world. “What kills culture is homogenization, conformity, even that to which we submit unconsciously or culpably due to mental laziness, due to opportunism,” he said.