🪩 Edinburgh Culture Minute: 7-13 Feb 2024

Welcome to the 32nd edition of the Culture Minute, a weekly round-up of Edinburgh’s local creative news, events, jobs and opportunities. It’s for paying subscribers only, so thank you for supporting this. Thanks to everyone who contributed! It really is a community effort and I just curate most of it. 

🎶  Building work continues at Leith Theatre, where various contractors have been making significant repairs as part of a years-long effort to secure the venue’s longterm future. The venue is now watertight and has new rigging and houselights installed. There’s still plenty to be done before live performances return: read the latest update here.
⮑ You can get a look in on Thursday 22 February for a heritage tour of the venue.
  ⮑  Meantime, performers from the Leith Theatre amdram group continue to hit stages across town. Their next show is at Church Hill Theatre later this month.

🎭 What else is on Edinburgh’s stages this week, courtesy of Thom Dibdin of All Edinburgh Theatre:

“There’s plenty to see on Edinburgh’s stages this week, with big local interest from EUSC who are staging The Taming of the Shrew (tickets) weekday nights and the Lyceum opening Two Sisters (tickets) for previews on Saturday.

The big musical is the arrival of the Regents Park Open Air Theatre production of Jesus Christ Superstar at the Playhouse all week (tickets), while there are some great things still to come in the Manipulate Festival 2024 (preview & ticket links).

As always, here’s a preview of the week’s theatre offerings with all the links you need.”

📚  Last week I listed as many February local bookshop events as I could find. Thanks to reader Allison Everett for sending in the Fruitmarket Bookshop listings too: 

“We have our annual Artists Bookmarket this weekend.

There will be a talk that weekend by our deputy director and head of publishing about our publishing programme through our 50 years of operating. 

Our next book launch event is Leah Hazard in conversation with Dr. Kate Womersley about her Saltire Book if the year ‘Womb’.“

🎨  Organisers of Edinburgh Zine Festival have sent an open letter ‘to highlight and condemn Fruitmarket’s silence in the face of on-going genocide, and their current funding relationship with investment firm Baillie Gifford’. They accuse the company of using sponsorship of cultural venues ‘to artwash their activities’. Baillie Gifford has previously said it is committed to contributing to the arts. 
  ⮑  A Fruitmarket spokesperson said they ‘have had a meeting with representatives of the Edinburgh Zine Library and conversations are ongoing.’ The festival organisers say the zine fest will still go ahead at Fruitmarket this weekend and they expect ‘an on-going conversation’. 

📙  A new fortnightly book club for teenagers starts at Wester Hailes Library on Monday 12 February - Details are on page-2 here. The adults’ book club details are here. 

🎤  Michael Pedersen hosts a free creative writing open mic showcase at the University of Edinburgh next Tuesday. - More details here.

🎻  Music on the Mezzanine returns to the Central Library this month. The fortnightly series will run until mid-June. - Free tickets are here.

⛰️  Sound artist Siân Landau has created a soundscape exploring the geological history of Holyrood Park. Next week you can join Siân on a walk to create your own. - More details here. 

💃  This month’s listings at Leith Arches include burlesque and bric-a-brac.

🎹  Expect beautiful sounds at Leith Depot on Friday night as Dám Ru, Faith Eliott and Marcus Engwall take to the stage for the first of Other Other Music’s new Friday slot. - Tickets (and music samples by each act) are here.

🎸  This year’s Stag & Dagger festival line up is confirmed for 4 May at venues in the city centre. Tickets are up here. - Thanks to Nick Stewart for sharing the details.

🗞️  February’s edition of The Skinny is out. You can read the full thing here.

✈️ A new series of 17 lunchtime discussions about ‘Future Travel Narratives’ is hosted by the Traveltech hub at Edinburgh Futures Institute. - Watch the first sessions here.

🗜️  Edinburgh Sculpture Workshop has launched this year’s programme of public courses. Starting from April, you can learn wood carving, stone carving, clay portraiture and/or ceramics. They’re open to everyone from beginners to experienced makers and are billed as ‘a great way to explore sculptural methods, learn different processes and make artworks.’ - Find out more here.

🤝  Networking, jobs and funding opportunities: 

Here are this week’s shiny new opportunities, followed by the ‘still open’ list: