Consternation in the Catalan cultural sector. The Generalitat of Catalonia was about to approve the highest Culture budget in its history, 566 million euros, 1.7% of its total accounts. A budget that just a few years ago would have seemed like science fiction: in 2014, in the midst of the crisis, Artur Mas left the money destined for the cultural world at only 225.7 million. They were 30 euros per inhabitant per year, compared to the 60 invested today by the department headed by Natàlia Garriga and the almost 71 of the rejected budget that ended in early elections.
A budget that the world of culture celebrated in style because it was close to the figure they have been demanding for years, 2%, in line with the European average, and whose fall – and that of the Government – ??will now leave laws in the drawer – that of the Film Library was currently being processed in Parliament, and the pioneering proposal for a law on Cultural Rights for all citizens was about to be done -, it will cause a reduced budget for the large institutions – the MNAC alone loses a million – and will leave ambitious projects on the air, such as Catalunya Media City and La Foneria, which had important budget allocations for their development. Also compromised by a possible change of government after the elections is the role of Manuel Borja-Villel as a new museum advisor who helps the Department of Culture with an ambitious rethinking of its museums.
By extending the budgets, culture in Catalonia will have, it is soon said, 90 million euros less. Of them, 2.4 went to the La Foneria building on the Rambla, which was to be reference equipment in the field of digital arts, but above all ten went to an iconic project of the Aragonese Government, the strategic Catalunya Media City. By 2024, ten million were planned for the acquisition of land and for the adaptation of the Turbines warehouse in the Tres Xemeneies del Besòs, so that the plan to establish a large digital, audiovisual and video game hub of global reference can materialize there. in training, research, creation and innovation.
A great project in a country affected by the early elections that led the Department of Culture yesterday to state that they are already working “to reorganize the budget and continue the plans for Catalunya Mèdia City in terms of the acquisition of land, for La Foneria in the restoration of the façade and the project for drafting and directing the rehabilitation works of the building, and to carry out the preliminary project and the basic project of the Palau Requesens”, in which the Generalitat had designed the Casa de les Lletres, another of the emblematic projects de Garriga, a space that was the pillar of the country’s literary creation and the epicenter of activity for the world of books and that was to host the Institució de les Lletres Catalanes or the Reial Acadèmia de Bones Lletres. In addition, the National Archive of Catalonia in Sant Cugat had budgeted 5.5 million for its expansion.
Without the new budget, furthermore, large cultural institutions will no longer receive considerable amounts, which will force them to reduce their plans. If the MNAC will stop receiving a million, the Liceu and the TNC will stop increasing their subsidy by 600,000 euros, the Palau de la Música by half a million, the Mercat de les Flors by 400,000, the Lliure by more than 300,000 and the Tàpies foundations and Miró will no longer receive 100,000 euros. Successful projects such as La Cultivadora, in which the large performing institutions of Barcelona meet with the educational community to unite culture and education from the beginning, are also in danger.
The audiovisual sector, another of the big bets as the economic and cultural engine of Catalonia, and which was going to receive 35.5 million – 17% more than the previous year – for its own production, will also see its possibilities for creating films reduced. larger in size and projection like Saben That.
And the budgets of the Generalitat are not the only ones that have fallen with the early elections: on the rebound, Pedro Sánchez has found it impossible to approve general budgets of the State for this year and has ordered his ministries to work on those for 2025. Paradoxically, In the ministry headed by Ernest Urtasun there seems to be less concern. Ministerial sources emphasize that the extension of the 2023 budgets should not affect too much the plans that have been drawn up for the legislature for two very different reasons. The first, because the budget that was approved for 2023 and is now extended for this year is already the largest in the history of the ministry and they were working on a continuity proposal. For 2023, 1,703 million euros were approved compared to 1,496 in 2022. Figures, as in Catalonia, never achieved before and reached now thanks in part to European funds from the Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan, which amounted to 364 million in 2022, 296 in 2023 and this year they will be fewer.
The other reason that there is no concern about the extension is that, just four months after taking possession of the ministry, the current team sees 2024 as a year to design their projects well. At the beginning of the legislature, the first year is used to design, plan and commission projects. They are in the executive phase rather than the design phase. Thus, the National Center of Photography or Tabacalera is in the design phase, while Urtasun’s proposal for a new Biennial of Culture and Climate Change is for 2026. The year 2025, on the other hand, is more important in the ministry because They must begin works, but also provide the money for the expansion of the National Museum of Art of Catalonia or the Museum of Contemporary Art of Barcelona.
