Reviews & features: Visual art

David Mach: Precious Light

Edinburgh Art Festival exhibition of biblical proportions by Fife-born artist

Without doubt, Methil-born artist David Mach’s work ‘Golgotha’ will stand out as the defining image from the artistic strand of this year’s Edinburgh Festival. Three enormous figures of threaded steel nailed to metallic crosses, which take up the entire…

Anton Henning: Interieur No. 493

Curious and bemusing conceptual art salon at 2011 Edinburgh Art Festival

If, as critic and writer Cyril Connolly once noted, ‘vulgarity is the garlic in the salad of life’ German artist Anton Henning might just have halitosis. Henning’s first solo show in Scotland is just about as curious and bemusing an exhibition as you…

Lineage: Michael Craig-Martin, Ian Davenport and Julian Opie

Edinburgh Art Festival 2010 - Printmaking, but not as we know it

Drip, drip, drip go the variations on a theme that form the quartet of works culled from Ian Davenport’s ‘Etched Puddle’ series, in which assorted rainbow-arrayed, candy-striped, multi-coloured streams trickle down into a similarly hued liquid carpet at…

Robert Rauschenberg: Botanical Vaudeville

Sparkling post-industrial dance on gleaming surfaces

Inverleith House has long carved a niche for itself as a champion of late 20th century American icons, and for the gallery’s British Art Show contribution has gathered up a grab-bag of 37 works made between 1982 and 1998 by Abstract Expressionism’s…

Hayashi Takeshi: Haku-u (White Rain)

Impressive hand-carved sculptures

Once upon a time, Japanese artist Hayashi Takeshi looked out over a paddy field in the rain, the texture of the water’s surface as each inverted wet plop rose and fell clearly ingraining itself on his memory. With the primary and titular work on display…

The Northern Renaissance: Dürer to Holbein

Compendium of works inspired by the Renaissance innovator

There’s something of an inky-fingered Dürer overload in the ‘burgh just now. Following on from Dürer’s Fame over at the National Galleries, this 16th century compendium of more than 100 works uses his output as a springboard for the burgeoning of…

Tony Cragg

Stunning showcase of sculptor’s poetic, monolithic output

From Scouse lab technician to director of Kunstakademie, Düsseldorf, Cragg’s prolific artistic journey has been one of inspiration and rejection, absorption and a will to move beyond. While the works of Max Ernst, Richard Long, Joseph Beuys and Henry…

Elizabeth Blackadder

Brilliant retrospective of work by one of Scotland’s major artists

Elizabeth Blackadder is a Dame, a Royal Academician and arguably Scotland’s most popular female painter and printmaker. A major retrospective of her work at Scotland’s biggest gallery space was only ever going to draw sighs of resignation from art snobs…

Sounds of Fringe - Stream and record audio from the Edinburgh Festival

Soundcloud-based app for iPhone and Android documents 2011 Fringe

New collaborative project, Sounds of Fringe allows anyone to post or stream audio from anywhere in the capital throughout the Festival, the fruits of which will be tagged and appear on an online map. Like all Soundcloud files, you can add your own…

World Press Photo 2011 in Edinburgh - Jodi Bieber interview

Photo of mutilated young Afghan woman a symbol of tormented times

Bibi Aisha was 18 when the Taliban came calling for her just before midnight. Forced into a mountain clearing in the southern Afghan province of Uruzgan, she was put on trial and convicted by a local commander. Her crime: fleeing from a violent husband…

Artist Martin Creed replaces Edinburgh steps with marble from around world

The Turner Prize winner transforms the Scotsman Steps

Now in its eighth year, the Edinburgh Art Festival (EAF) has done wonders in raising the profile of the capital's rich assortment of galleries while showcasing an eye-watering array of works by international artists. No stranger to Edinburgh, Turner…

400 Women - Tamsyn Challenger interview

Edinburgh Art Festival 2011 show inspired by tragic events

For the last couple of decades of least, the gallery-centred world of contemporary art has been a largely apolitical space, with the popularity of conceptual and often oblique work tending to overshadow that of artists engaging with or responding…

Edinburgh Art Festival 2011 highlights

David Mach, Tamsyn Challenger and Anish Kapoor among picks

David Mach. Explosive and daring exhibition of large-scale collage and sculpture works inspired by and confronting the narratives of the Bible on the 400th anniversary of the publication of the highly influential King James version. 400 Women. A…

Why Edinburgh remains unrivalled as a festival city

A huge number and variety of festivals take place each year

In 1961, a theatre director made a proposal. It was his opinion that the Edinburgh Festival Fringe was getting too big. It would be much better, he said, ‘if only ten halls were licensed’. Nobody listened. Had the director been able to travel…

Ian Reddie: Dirt, Glue, Gluedust

The Edinburgh-based artist presents mixed media paintings, screen prints and digital art evoking a primordial world of desert and rock. Art’s Complex, 661 1924, until 5 Sep (not Mon/Tue), free.

Amnesty International Urban Art Exhibition

Syrkus, Rekor, Derm, Conzo, Mark Lyken and Elph

Urban art created onsite at a live event at the start of the festival by Syrkus, Rekor, Derm, Conzo, Mark Lyken and Elph as part of Amnesty’s festival-wide campaign to highlight the need for freedom of expression all around the world. C soco Urban…

Barbara Rae and Matthew Draper

Contrasting Landscapes, Painterly Abstractions

Two distinct and individual responses to contemporary landscape painting from the two Scottish artists. Open Eye Gallery, 557 1020, until 31 Aug (not Sun), free.

Plan B

Nuanced and arresting marriage of text and image

One of the most immediately arresting images of the Edinburgh Art Festival, photographer Norman McBeath’s black and white of a sculpture of Apollo swathed in smothering polythene, stands to represent a unique collaboration between this artist and…

Philip Braham: Falling Shadows In Arcadia

Insensitively curated exhibition pits the fragility of human life against the enduring landscape

This exhibition of photographic prints by the Royal Scottish Academy’s Morton Award winner 2009 comprises two rather different series’. The most prominent pictures are of black and white scenes – forests, bodies of water, vacant bridges – that have been…

EAF host first UK solo show by Iran do Espírito Santo

Brazilian-born artist exhibits at Edinburgh's Ingleby Gallery

The name Iran do Espírito Santo may not be a household word on these shores, but brace yourselves, the Brazilian-born artist is about to take the Edinburgh Art Festival by storm. Next month at the Ingleby Gallery, Scotland will have the opportunity to…

Atsuo Okamoto: Faraway Mountain

A strong sense of both exploration and play

Walking among Atsuo Okamoto’s granite sculpture feels rather like exploring a prehistoric puzzle – 12 pillars, erupting from the ground, cracked and split into pieces then carefully put back together. The Japanese sculptor’s first solo show in the…

The Space Between

Erratic mixed printmaking show

Taking the theme of ‘space’ as its departure, it is unsurprising that the selection of work in Amber Art’s current show is erratic: by its very nature all artwork deals with space. It appears instead that the term is a comfortable theme within which to…

Chris Close's exhibition at the Edinburgh Book Festival 2010

Chris Close seems to have established himself as the portrait photographer of choice for the Edinburgh International Book Festival. The authors visiting the festival to present their work and thoughts have been captured in a series of pictures by Close…

A Drawback

The phenomenon of drawing has enjoyed a resurgence in recent years, with many artists now returning to producing, exhibiting and selling contemporary drawings. This exhibition by Perennial Art celebrates the diversity and richness of the practice and…

5 Questions - Invisible Structures

Invisible Structures has created a special outdoor environment of hidden treasures, workshops, performances, art and science experiments guided by interactive performers to Edinburgh’s Royal Botanic Gardens. Claudia Mosely from Invisible Works takes…