EdFringe lockdown memories: Day Nine
The #NothingToReviewHere and #SomethingToReview projects
In the eerily fallow Fringe of 2020 and weirdly hybrid event of the following year, The Dibdin Brothers, Thom & Peter, published a daily image from around Edinburgh.
These projects – #NothingToReviewHere and #SomethingToReview – showed the Edinburgh Fringe as it had never been seen before. And in that first year, when everyone had to stay at home, provided a surrogate fringe for its fans to witness from afar. There is an introduction to the projects here: #NothingToReviewHere.
This is first of two Day Nine posts – in 2020 it was the day the Book Fest was supposed to be opening. Little did we know that it would would leaving its long-term home, Charlotte Square the very next year. So that is where we went…
EdBookFest: Day One
Edinburgh Charlotte Square. Saturday 15 August 2020
Edinburgh. Charlotte Square. Saturday 15 August Edinburgh International Book Festival 2020 Day 1. Pic: Peter Dibdin
Fallow Ed BookFest. Day 1: Peter Dibdin and I were there.
Edinburgh. Charlotte Square. Saturday 15 August Edinburgh International Book Festival 2020 Day 1. Pic: Peter Dibdin
No Author’s Yurt, no Spiegeltent.
No book shops, no urgent queue for today’s returns.
No ice-cream concession, gin concession or deck chairs.
No duckboard walk and no mud.
No queue round the block for the signing tent.
No authors.
No books.
Prince Albert rides alone behind the locked gate.
#21Venues21Shirts Day 9 EXTRA #NothingToReviewHere #ItsGoneOnline
Edinburgh Art College on Lauriston Place. Saturday 14 August 2021
Edinburgh. Art College on Lauriston Place. Saturday 14 August 2021 #Hybrid Edinburgh International Book Festival Day 1. Pic: Peter Dibdin
Fallow Ed BookFest. Day 1: Peter Dibdin and I were there.
New year, new venue
Same style
The Book Fest is moving on.
But books are still at its core,
Authors, interviews, readers
A chance to meet each other.
Trees, gin and ice cream
All help create an oasis of calm, in this already calm year.
The Big Screen is new
And covered seats to view it.
Lime trees drop sticky resin and sweet scent
Authors drop big ideas and sonorous words.
Our new hang-out.
#SomethingToReview Day 9
Edinburgh. Art College on Lauriston Place. Saturday 14 August 2021 #Hybrid Edinburgh International Book Festival Day 1. The Long View. Pic: Peter Dibdin
But there is more!
Of course, we couldn’t be sure whether the images for 2020 taken in the middle of the road would work… So we also piled over the fence into the locked Gardens.
Edinburgh. Charlotte Square. Saturday 15 August Edinburgh International Book Festival 2020 Day 1. Pic: Peter Dibdin.
It was a right palaver, passing the bike over the fence and all.
As for the College of Art in 2021… I think Peter took more pictures, and we spent more time looking for the right shot, than in any other location. There was just so much choice.
I rather like this one – it looks like the author on the big screen is blessing our project.
Edinburgh. Art College on Lauriston Place. Saturday 14 August 2021 #Hybrid Edinburgh International Book Festival Day 1. Pic: Peter Dibdin
Then there was the question of sticking with a theme of previous images, which had been to foreground Edinburgh’s monumental buildings…
Edinburgh. Art College on Lauriston Place. Saturday 14 August 2021 #Hybrid Edinburgh International Book Festival Day 1. Pic: Peter Dibdin
Or should we be playful? That is the author’s signing tent behind me, I think. And there were signings going on. Everyone socially distanced. The Book Festival was the place which had the most activity of anywhere we had been so far.
Edinburgh. Art College on Lauriston Place. Saturday 14 August 2021 #Hybrid Edinburgh International Book Festival Day 1. Pic: Peter Dibdin
There was also the question of Peter’s love affair with light. He couldn’t help but try and find a way to make use of the reflected light from the Art College’s new buildings…
Edinburgh. Art College on Lauriston Place. Saturday 14 August 2021 #Hybrid Edinburgh International Book Festival Day 1. Pic: Peter Dibdin
The new Book Festival venue looks good, but I think we are all going to miss the trees of both Charlotte Square and the Art College quad. They really gave the event a different vibe.
ENDS
