524 million euros: this is the Culture budget for 2026, detailed this Wednesday by the Minister of Culture, Sònia Hernández Almodóvar. It forms part of the Generalitat budgets agreed by the PSC and the Comunsbut to be approved in Parliament they need the support ofERC, which for the moment has presented a comprehensive amendmentIf approved, these would be the highest budgets in history, including in the cultural sphere. This 524 million euro figure is 118 million more than the 405 million euro budget for 2023; at that time, the total for Culture was 477 million euro because it also included Language, which in 2026 will have its own budget within the Department of Language Policy. In 2026, the combined budget for Culture and Language will be 609 million euro. Compared to the budgets presented by Pere Aragonès's government in 2024, which were rejected by the Comuns party, the increase for Culture and Language is 43 million euros. Despite this considerable increase within a total budget of 49.162 billion euros, Culture (and Language) is still far from the coveted 2% to which both the Aragonès and Salvador Illa governments had committed. The 609 million represents 1.7%, two tenths more than in 2023. This 1.7% is not in relation to the total 49,162 million, but rather to 36,070 million, which, according to the Department of Culture, is the figure remaining after excluding "final and financial funds" (79 million). The budgets defended by Councilor Hernández Almodóvar include actions already announced such as the MNAC expansion project (60 million), the reconversion of the Old Canons' Phonetic Workshop of Barcelona's Rambla in a digital culture center (10.4 million), the new House of Letters in the Palau Requesens in Barcelona (7 million), the expansion of the Macba (5 million), the renovation of the Library of Catalonia (5 million), the expansion of the Filmoteca's conservation space in Terrassa (3.4 million), and the renovation of the Mercat de les Flors (1.7 million), among others. One of the major new developments is a 75 million euro investment to protect museum collections: a 35,000 m² space.² in a location yet to be determined "in the center of the country." It will house the "joint national reserves" of museums, including the Museum of Natural Sciences, the MNAC (National Art Museum of Catalonia), and the MACBA (Museum of Contemporary Art of Barcelona). It's worth noting that the expansion of the MNAC and the MACBA is not to create more storage space, but rather to provide more exhibition space.