Edinburgh has a wealth of cultural venues and sites where you can experience intermediality live and find inspiration for your research projects. This is a cultural map in progress:
Explore the city’s treasures and enjoy! Many of the venues are free (marked with *).
THE VISUAL ARTS
*National Galleries of Scotland: Four leading museums of historic, modern and contemporary art.
*City Art Center: Historic and contemporary Scottish visual and applied arts
*Fruitmarket Gallery: Contemporary Art exhibitions)
*Stills Center for Photography
*Talbot Rice Gallery: University of Edinburgh’s public art gallery.
*Collective Gallery: New work by artists at a pivotal stage of their development.
Summerhall: A cultural hub that showcases a diversity of artistic events, from art exhibition, to theatre, live music and film screenings. Includes a beautiful courtyard with an on-site brewery and Gin distillery, home to a varied community of creative practitioners.
CINEMA
Filmhouse: Scotland’s leading independent cinema and home of the Edinburgh International Film Festival. Their programme includes film from all over the world, via restored classics, retrospectives and themed seasons and festivals. [NB: currently closed, but we are hoping for it to be rescued and reopened; please follow this link for further info]
Cameo Cinema: Another independent cinema with a reputation among cinephiles that also serves as a venue for the Edinburgh International Film Festival.
And Edinburgh of course has a large number of film venues such as Vue Cinemas, Cineworld, etc.
THEATER/PERFORMANCE
Traverse Theatre: Scotland’s new writing theatre.
Bedlam Theatre: Entirely student-run theatre.
The Lyceum Theatre: Scotland’s leading producing theatre, championing classical and contemporary work.
BALLET, OPERA, MUSIC
Festival Theatre: Dance, live music, theatre.
Usher Hall: Scotland’s leading concert venue.
The Queen’s Hall: Edinburgh’s premier independent mid-sized live music venue (classical, jazz, folk, rock, pop)
St Cecilia’s Hall Concert Room & Museum: Scotland’s oldest purpose-built concert hall; home to the University of Edinburgh collection of historic musical instruments.
LITERATURE
*The Writers’ Museum: Celebrating Robert Burns, Walter Scott and Robert Louis Stevenson)
*WORKS BY PHOEBE TRAQUAIR: Leading Scottish Arts and Crafts artist; first woman to be elected to the Royal Scottish Academy
*Song School of St Mary’s Cathedral
*WORKS BY EDUARDO PAOLOZZI: Major Scottish and European 20th century artist, sculptor, printmaker; one of the pioneers of pop art
This interactive map identifies artworks by Paolozzi and locations linked to his life in the city.
The book Paolozzi at large in Edinburgh (Luath Press: Edinburgh, 2018), co-edited by Christine De Luca and Carlo Pirozzi (available in Main Library), includes reproductions of twelve of Paolozzi’s major artworks in Edinburgh, alongside twelve poems written in response by Christine De Luca, with translations into Italian by Francesca Romana Paci. For each of the artworks featured, there is also an accompanying creative commentary written by a prominent researcher, as well as more personal reflections by the writer Vivian French, whose brother Ray Watson was for 30 years Paolozzi’s main assistant and model maker. The book also includes reproductions of artworks by members of the Royal Scottish Academy.
