The Benefit for Ukraine’s People and Culture

Venice Biennale Arte 2022 Gala Raises Over €1 Million to Support Humanitarian Efforts in Ukraine

The Venice Biennale event celebrated Venice and the arts to raise aid for the people of Ukraine

Peter Brant Jr & Ivy Getty, together with Ulla Parker and Erica Pelosini, and in partnership with Sortium Blockchain Studio, hosted a charity gala event last night Thursday, April 21 at the Scuola Grande di San Rocco in Venice Italy. Over €1 million was raised, to support several charities who are working tirelessly to help the Ukrainian people and communities impacted by the current conflict with Russia.

The event’s inception was conceived by Peter Brant Jr and Ivy Getty, joined by Ulla Parker and Erica Pelosini with the Therme Art sponsorship making the idea a reality. The gala featured renowned charity auctioneer Simon de Pury who led the live auction, and an NFT silent auction from Sortium Blockchain Studio.

The event highlighted The Appeal of Conscience Foundation, the Museums of Ukraine and a number of frontline charitable organizations, including the Maria Prymachenko Family Foundation, the Ukrainian frontier organization 100% Life, the Museum Crisis Centre, as well as the Ukrainian Emergency Pavilion, a project of the Ukrainian Emergency Art Fund. All of whom are selflessly working to help the people of Ukraine who have been affected by the ongoing conflict. There has been significant infrastructure damage that has left hundreds of thousands of people without electricity or water, while damaged roads have disrupted supply chains, leaving communities cut off from food and basic supplies. The honored charities have worked around the clock providing emergency aid.

“The Ukrainian people really need our help,” said Peter M. Brant, of the Brant Foundation, and member of the Advisory Council of the Appeal of Conscience Foundation. “Whatever we can do big or small we need to do for them now.”

In the coming weeks, volunteers will increase their humanitarian aid including working to reunite separated families, providing food and other household items, and increasing awareness about areas contaminated by unexploded ordnance. The current needs are tremendous, critical among them include water delivery, support to health facilities and medical care for families wounded.

Special thanks to the gala hosts Peter Brant Jr., Ivy Getty, Cecilia Alemani, Princess Alia Al-Senussi, Roksana Ciurysek-Gedir, Marc Glimcher & Fairfax Dorn, Simon de Pury, Robert Hanea, Masha Isserlis, Hans Ulrich Obrist, Ulla Parker, Erica Pelosini, Mikolaj Sekutowicz & Sara Faraj, Tej Tadi, and Francesca Thyssen-Bornemisza, Matteo Corvino, Allen Booth, Larry Gagosian and the event sponsors Ikona Collection, TBA21 Thyssen-Bornemisza Art Contemporary, Maria Prymachenko Family Foundation, Therme Art, Mindmaze, de Pury, Aab Productions, Zuecca Projects, and Sortium Blockchain Studio.

Press Coverage

  • The War in Ukraine Has Seeped Into Venice’s Glamorous Art Biennale

    Less than an hour after VIPs filed into Venice’s Giardini to view the opening of Venice’s 59th Art Biennale, a lone man in a dark overcoat unfurled a sign in front of an empty building normally used by Russia to show art. The sign read, in part: “I AM STANDING HERE IN FRONT OF THE RUSSIAN PAVILION AGAINST THE WAR AND AGAINST RUSSIAN GOVERNMENT CULTURAL TIES.”

  • Simon de Pury on How He Pulled Off a $1.3 Million Ukraine Fundraiser at the Venice Biennale in No Time

    Every month in The Hammer, art-industry veteran Simon de Pury lifts the curtain on his life as the ultimate art-world insider, his brushes with celebrity, and his invaluable insight into the inner workings of the art market.

  • Venice Biennale Arte 2022 Gala Raises Over €1 Million to Support Humanitarian Efforts in Ukraine

    Peter Brant Jr & Ivy Getty, together with Ulla Parker and Erica Pelosini, and in partnership with Sortium Blockchain Studio, hosted a charity gala event Thursday, April 21 at the Scuola Grande di San Rocco in Venice Italy. Over €1 million was raised, to support several charities who are working tirelessly to help the Ukrainian people and communities impacted by the current conflict with Russia.