After the alliance between the Hermitage and the Gran Teatre del Liceu came to nothing due to Barcelona City Council's refusal to install a private branch of the Russian museum on land owned by Barcelona's port, the opera house has continued working to find a suitable location to open a second hall, which would be dedicated to more experimental and contemporary projects. As ARA has been able to learn, this new site will be the former Imax cinema at Port Vell, closed since 2014. This is what is being proposed this Wednesday at Liceu's executive committee, where the administrations that make it up (Barcelona City Council, the Gran Teatre del Liceu, the Spanish Ministry of Culture and Barcelona Provincial Council) are represented. If it receives the approval of the institutions, the general director of the theatre will be asked to present a project in the spring and, at the same time, the process of seeking funding to move it forward will begin. The Catalan Culture Department does not want to evaluate the operation until it sees "the viability of the project". The proposal could lead to a broader agreement than the joining the Hermitage did, as the previous one it did not even have the necessary space for a concert hall and a museum at the same time.

The Board of Directors of the Port of Barcelona has voted in favour of granting a site to the franchise of the Hermitage museum. Thus, the entity, on whose board the City Council of Barcelona sits, has ignored the request for extra time made yesterday by the city and has given free rein to private investors to move forward with the project if they obtain authorisation from the City Council. The City asked for the withdrawal of this item from the agenda, but the Port has ignored the second request for postponement of the decision. According to the communiqué issued by the Port, the concession is conditional on "a joint project between the Hermitage and the Gran Teatre del Liceu being presented within two months and the approval of an agreement between the Port and the Barcelona City Council. With this cooperation, the future space would be promoted as a multidisciplinary and transversal cultural centre," the communiqué also states, "endowed with a differential character and with a strong local component and rooted in the city, uniting the Gran Teatre del Liceu ensign to the project. The new proposal also responds to the demands of Barcelona City Council for an innovative cultural project, more for the local public and sustainable from the point of view of mobility". Liceu sources say they maintain the same position as in recent days and declined to make further statements.

While the public debate has been restricted to the dilemma of Hermitage yes or no, a position in which the Port Authority and the Barcelona City Council are stuck without agreement, another project has been brewing in parallel that now appears on the scene, and to which ARA has had access. It is a facility that would be called European Urban Tech and would be a centre to address the ecological and technological transformation of cities. It would be installed in a lighthouse building, a unique and sustainable architectural project, with the desire to be emblematic of 21st century Barcelona, and which would be located precisely on the land that the Port has committed to the franchise of the Hermitage. It would have three parts: a laboratory and research cente; a training branch; and knowledge transfer to companies linked to urban innovation (energy, mobility, resources, housing, etc.).