The 14th Edinburgh Art Festival gets underway tomorrow (27th July) with a multitude of free exhibitions and art related events over the next month.
“Edinburgh Art Festival offers an unrivalled opportunity to immerse yourself in art drawn from across the world and the centuries, stretching from Caravaggio and Constable, by way of Turner Prize winners, to the most exciting recent graduates making art today,” says Edinburgh Art Festival director Sorcha Carey.
Most of the city’s major public galleries as well as private galleries and artist run spaces will be involved with over 45 exhibitions across 35 venues.
This year’s festival commissioned works which can be found in locations around the city are inspired by two anniversaries: the publication 100 years ago of visionary thinker Patrick Geddes text “The Making of the Future: A Manifesto and a Project” and the 70th anniversary of the Edinburgh International Festival. Both anniversaries, separated by a generation, were inspired by the ending of bloody wars and the potential of a more ideal world where artists played a vital role.
Carey said: “Geddes famously advised that ‘We need to give everyone the outlook of the artist’ - and in ‘The Making of the Future: a manifesto and a project’ published in 1917, he laid out his vision for a new form of society in which ‘Art and Industry… would henceforth advance in unison’. Profoundly international in his outlook and influence, Geddes’ ideas and thinking laid the foundations for the rich festival culture that has evolved in our city - and our programme of new work by Scottish and international artists, reminds us of his continued relevance in 2017.”
Tomorrow, at 2pm, artists Walker and Bromwich will bring a giant inflatable dragon to the gothic kirk of Trinity Apse, where through a series of playful performative rituals and a public pageant they’ll invite the audience to participate and imagine utopian alternatives to our current capitalist system.
It’s one of eight eight new projects by Scottish and international artists at six sites in and around Edinburgh’s Old Town - look out for Geddes themed works at Chessels Court, the High Street, Johnstone Terrace Wildlife Garden, and Edinburgh College of Art. There’s also a rare opportunity to visit Geddes’ original home in Ramsay Garden.
Other events at the Edinburgh Art Festival include artist talks, special tours, weekly Art Lates and activities for families and young children.