The Edinburgh International Festival today announced its director Jonathan Mills is to remain in his post until Festival 2014.
"The opportunities that major sporting events – the Olympics, Paralympics and Commonwealth Games – offer the Festival, Edinburgh and Scotland in 2012 and 2014 make my role as Festival Director particularly exciting," said Mills, who was appointed as Director of the Festival in February 2006 and presented his first Festival in August 2007.
Mills has brought a succession of themed programmes to the Festival, around the relationship between words and music in Artists without Borders; the Scottish Enlightenment; The New Worlds; and this year on the cultures of India, China, Taiwan, Korea, Indonesia, Vietnam, Japan and their influence.
However, Mills suggested that a direct thematic link between the EIF and the Commonwealth or Olympic games would be "absurd", although he will be aiming to attract the influx of tens of thousands of visitors who will be looking to travel elsewhere in the UK.
"I will bring all my experience as Director of the Melbourne Festival during the Sydney Olympics to making the most of these," he said.
The 2011 Edinburgh International Festival runs from Friday 12 August to Sunday 4 September, Jonathan will unveil the programme on Wednesday 23 March.