The team governing the Huesca City Council has removed the funding line dedicated to the Periferias Festival at the behest of Vox. Since its inception in 2000, this line supported avant-garde art in Huesca, the capital of the region, and became a recognizable centerpiece of the city’s cultural calendar.
During the presentation of the 2024 budget on Monday, the mayor, Lorena Orduna, from the Partido Popular, announced that no allocation for the festival would appear in the new budget. This decision lines up with Vox’s campaign stance, which made clear that any votes needed for the budget would be tied to a push for greater municipal reserves rather than backing the festival as it stood.
Historically, Vox has opposed the Periferias Festival, arguing in its campaigns that the festival was effectively used to pour hundreds of thousands of euros into a progressive cultural agenda. The party has consistently criticized what it describes as excessive funding for certain cultural initiatives while urging a broader approach to municipal spending.
The budget presentation followed a political deal between the two parties, with council member Jose Luis Rubio of Vox present to verify accounts. The agreement required support from a total of twelve council members from the Popular Party, with two votes coming from Vox in order to approve the overall budget package.
Although the press conference did not explicitly address this issue, Vox later stated that the Periferias Festival line had been removed. In its place, the plan includes a new festival focused on entertainment, culture, and festivities aimed at young people aged 14 to 25, integrated into the program as a different cultural offering.
Later, city council sources indicated that the cultural festival allocation would remain in spirit, even as the approach to programming was described as introducing a new perspective on cultural events. The intention, according to these sources, is to reflect a genuine demand from Huesca residents and to broaden participation in cultural life across the city.
To pursue this, the city government signaled a forthcoming participatory process. In the near term, residents will be invited to contribute ideas about the program and to weigh in on the festival’s name. This move is framed as bringing community input directly into cultural planning, with the hope of aligning offerings with public interest rather than top-down decisions.
Since its early 2000s heyday, the Periferias Festival has been seen as a key platform for avant-garde and contemporary culture. The year 2000 marked a turning point, with widespread support for new artistic expressions and experimental formats in Huesca, a city known for its commitment to cultural diversity and creative risk taking.
The socialist group, the sole opposition faction on the council, expressed disappointment with the budget outcome through a formal statement. They argued that the mayor had aligned with what they described as a far right stance that opposes contemporary culture and had left the festival without an allocated budget. In their view, supporting mainline culture and attracting notable names to Alto Aragon were essential for elevating the city’s profile on national and international stages, a point they emphasized in a press release.