The emirate of Qatar donated 50 million euros to the City of Venice and in return was granted the right to open a national pavilion in the Giardini of the Biennale. The concession from the City is for 90 years. It will be the first new national pavilion since 1995 at the Giardini (the last had been Korea's), and the second ever for an Arab country in the Biennale's oldest space. The only existing one, Egypt's, has been located since 1952 in Brenno Del Giudice's 1932 building, which also houses the Venice Pavilion. The project was in the works since June, as confirmed in July, when the Gulf emirate made its donation as part of a cooperation plan that also includes the activation of Venice-Doha flights and the participation of emirate-controlled foundations in cultural projects in the lagoon. Biennale President Pietrangelo Buttafuoco welcomed the idea of the new pavilion: "The Venice Biennale is historically the thermometer of geopolitics. Common home of the peoples called to the disciplines of contemporary arts that it is, in its venues - and in the succession of a 130-year history - the Biennale restores the exact measure of an era”.