Letter from Barcelona: 'My fault is that I am an independent artist, not a carpet'

Why the success of the Bilbao Guggenheim worries people in Barcelona; and crisis at the National Theatre of Catalonia. By Justin Webster

Spaniards see no problem in spending money on what elsewhere might look like certifiably optimistic cultural schemes. In Britain, any plan which involves spending large sums of money on artistic projects usually meets with a sceptical reaction. The Millennium Dome in London, for example, has rarely been less than controversial.

But splashing out on culture in Spain doesn't seem to cause anyone any problems at all - so long as the project in question is spectacular. A giant titanium artichoke, on the banks of a highly polluted river, amid the ruins of a grimy industrial port? Inviting some very wealthy Americans to install their art collection in the new building, at a total cost of around $200m to the local Spanish taxpayer? No one in Bilbao seemed even to blink.

The first strange thing about the Guggenheim Museum project was the complete lack of doubt shown by those responsible for it - and particularly the regional Basque Government - as to whether it was really likely to become the cornerstone for city regeneration it was supposed to be. The project certainly had its critics. But they seemed that seemed to be worried mainly that the Guggenheim might be elitist, and that it wouldn't do enough for local Basque artists, only a few of whom - mainly sculptors - were judged good enough to make it inside.

Such worries didn't mean, these critics quickly added, that they did not like the Guggenheim's architecture. They all agreed, with a marked lack of sarcasm, that the architecture was magnificent. No one wanted to disown the sheer exuberance and daring of Frank Gehry's building.

And now, it seems that such "critics" have been proved right. The Guggenheim has only been open for 10 months now, but this week, it celebrated its millionth visitor. A startled 24-year-old called Nuria Gonzalez won a trip to China as she bought her ticket.

Since it opened, the museum has been maintaining a stubbornly international profile; its current exhibition, which opened on 18 July, is called China: 5,000 Years. Nearly 40 per cent of the people who have visited this show so far have come from abroad for this exhibition, and include 5,546 Britons. Even the most optimistic forecasts had not predicted that the Guggenheim would be quite such a resounding success.

Meanwhile, the city of Barcelona has watched Bilbao's success with growing unease. These are the grounds on which cities in Spain like to compete. Barcelona set a blistering pace throughout the 1980s and early 1990s with its Olympic-funded urban renewal and the use of signature architects like Norman Foster. One reason that Bilbao has since been able to entertain its own grandiose plans, employing an architect of Gehry's stature, is because the strategy had been seen to have paid off before.

But Barcelona's recent bids to make cultural news, even with an open chequebook, have foundered badly. And the most notorious came to an end last month when the city's most celebrated actor-director, Josep Maria Flotats, formally resigned as head of the new, huge, neo-classical National Theatre of Catalonia. "They are throwing me out for a crime of opinion," he told the press. "My fault is that I am an independent artist, not a carpet."

In his time, Flotats had come up some excellent - and reasonably successful - plays. At the opening of the new theatre a year ago, however, he left the great and good of the city flummoxed when he made a speech fiercely attacking the regional government - which is run by Catalan nationalists - and its cultural policies. He was immediately fired. But as his contract officially did not end until last month, he stayed on to perform a running commentary on the small-mindedness of his enemies. A high point was reached when he gave a rendition, for the cameras, of the regional Minister of Culture saying "I'm going to smash your face in." And Flotats has collected 22,000 signatures in his support.

A similar political mess has surrounded what should have been Catalonia's answer to the Guggenheim, Barcelona's Museum of Contemporary Art (MACBA), which has been designed by another star architect, Richard Meier. Meier's blindingly white edifice cost $15m, and appears to have landed like a spaceship in the midst of the crumbling tenements of the Barrio Chino.

The wrangling has been parochial, the museum's own collection mediocre, and its exhibitions - with the exception of a recent retrospective from the Majorca-born Miquel Barcelo - have been shunned by the public. The success of the Guggenheim helped prompt the firing of the MACBA's academic curator in June. His successor has now promised to "reinvent the museum of 2000 and the future" and to "revitalise the culture of of contemporary creation and situate Barcelona at the cutting edge in Spain and in the international scene".

That's just the sort of talk that goes down well here. And who knows: it might even work.