Sandra George at The City Art Centre, Edinburgh

Sandra George (1957-2013) was a community and youth worker in Edinburgh and a prolific social documentary photographer. A range of her photos are now collected together in an exhibition at Edinburgh's City Art Centre. 

The exhibition groups the photos into themes including family, disability and youth-work and features areas of Edinburgh that many people, even lots of long term city residents, aren't familiar with. It's certainly a good exhibition to have on during Edinburgh's summer festivals, as hopefully it will give many tourists a view into the Edinburgh communities that they generally won't see during their visit. 

George's photos are documentary, so she focussed on capturing the people and activities around her and her relationship with her own son. Many of the photos show her ability to elevate an ordinary moment into a timeless memory.

You can read a longer review by Lee Sharrock, along with a few selected photos from the exhibition here. 

 

Sandra George: Start from the Level showing at the City Art Centre, Edinburgh, until Sun, 27 Sept 2026

TrippyTakka at Edinburgh Canal Festival

 Yesterday we spent time at the Edinburgh Canal Festival. After walking along the canal, we sat in the sunshine at Lochrin Basin and listened to the excellent local band TrippyTakka. 

They're a rock and blues band who write their own music (not a single cover version while we were there) and they deserved a much bigger audience than they got yesterday. They had a bubble machine on for some of their songs, and I tried to capture the lovely way the bubbles were catching the sun, but without any great success!  

There are a couple more photos from the day on my Crafty Green Poet Blog here. 

Gaelic Graffiti

I was intrigued to find these examples of Gaelic graffiti in an underpass Edinburgh! 

 The graffiti above says: 

"Chan eil mi a' smaoineachadh gu bheil Gaidhlig cudromach: Tha fios agam, gu bheil" which translates as "I don't think Gaelic is important, I know it is" 

The graffiti above says "ionnsaich Gaidhlig" which simply translates as 'learn Gaelic' to which I can only reply, I'm trying!

Modern 2, National Galleries of Scotland

 Today I went to see the excellent Women in Revolt exhibition at Modern 2, one of the National Galleries of Modern Art in Edinburgh. I'd got there early and while I was waiting for my friend to arrive I took time to take some photos of the impressive architecture. 

The grounds offer views over to Dean Cemetery, which is one of Edinburgh's private cemeteries, so not one that I've done a wildlife survey of! 

The Women in Revolt exhibition looks at feminist art and activism in the 1970s - 1990s and includes paintings, zines, videos and other materials covering topics such as the Greenham Common Women's Peace Camp, wages for housework, lesbian identity, racism and other issues. It's well worth seeing (in fact I'm going back to see it tomorrow with a different friend!) before it closes on 26 January.

Chimneys at Lauriston Castle

 There's something quite beautiful about the chimneys at Edinburgh's Lauriston Castle!

You can read more about today's walk around the castle grounds over on Crafty Green Poet.

An Angel in the Woodland cemetery

 

This beautiful angel stands in Corstorphine Hill Cemetery, one of the 43 cemeteries in Edinburgh that I've been contracted to do wildlife surveys of over the next six months. 

Last week I surveyed this cemetery and Greyfriars Kirkyard, and you can read more over on my Crafty Green Poet blog, here.

Celtic Crosses of North Merchiston Cemetery

 Over lockdown, Crafty Green Boyfriend and I discovered two of the local cemeteries as wonderful wildlife havens. (I've blogged quite a lot about the wildlife of the cemeteries in my Crafty Green Poet blog). A Friends group has been set up for the North Merchiston Cemetery and I've joined the committee as the Wildlife Officer. We recently set up a Twitter account (@FofNMC which you can follow here). I'm tweeting about the wildlife, but also about some of the gravestones.

There are some beautiful Celtic crosses in the cemetery, the photos below show just a selection:

It's an old cemetery, few people are buried there now (unless you already have a family plot, you can't be buried there in fact). Some headstones have been vandalized in the past, some have been placed face down by the council because they were deemed dangerous. It would be nice to see all the stones replaced in their rightful positions, but apparently that would take many years to complete.

The cemetery has been neglected over the years, and is now fairly overgrown, which makes it a wonderful wildlife haven. There's a fine balance to be found between managing the area as a cemetery, while allowing nature to thrive.

The Snow People of Edinburgh

 We had a lot of snow last night and some people have been taking the opportunity to build some snow people!! Here are just a few of them!

Scenes from Edinburgh cemetries during #DailyExercise

The UK Government is, at the moment, allowing us out for one form of #DailyExercise once a day in addition to visiting the shops (as infrequently as possible), travelling to work (for those with essential jobs that can't be done from home) and medical emergencies including helping those who are self isolating.

Our route for our #DailyExercise takes us through a small community park and two cemeteries. You can see the nature notes from these walks over on my Crafty Green Poet blog, but here are photos of some of the most notable gravestones in the two cemeteries

Through the shadowy gate

late summer shadows on the entrance to Saughton Park, in Edinburgh, which recently reopened after a period of refurbishment. You can read my blog post about the recent opening event held in the park here on Crafty Green Poet and also see more recent photos of the park on my Crafty Green Poet blog here and here.

For Shadow Shot Sunday.

Marching for the EU and drinking Turkish Apple Tea

Drinking Turkish Apple Tea on the shady verandah of Cafe Truva in Edinburgh's Royal Mile after the anti-Brexit, pro-EU march.

  (We also had slices of the delicious Cafe Truva orange chocolate cake).

You can read more about the pro-EU march on my Crafty Green Poet blog here. 

for Shadow Shot Sunday.

Architecture in Shadow

It's a beautiful sunny day today, offering some great shadows on the buildings in the centre of Edinburgh

For Shadow Shot Sunday.

Shadow Shot Sunday - Scaffolding

For Shadow Shot Sunday.

More shadow shots in today's post over on Crafty Green Poet too.

Shadowy Shetland

Shadows on the ferry and port, waiting to return from Shetland

I blogged more about our holiday on Shetland over on my Crafty Green Poet blog, you can read my posts here, here, here and here.

For Shadow Shot Sunday. 

Dean Village, Edinburgh

more photos from today's walk over on my Crafty Green Poet blog.

Calton Hill

more photos on Crafty Green Poet

The Scottish National Monument was built in memory of the Scottish soldiers killed during the Napoleanic wars.

You can read more about the other monuments on Calton Hill here.

Moonlit Edinburgh Castle

Calton Hill

Bridge Shadows

Pedestrian Bridge over the River Esk, Musselburgh.

For Shadow Shot Sunday.

Calton Hill

the well known folly on Edinburgh's Calton Hill