The annual Art Walk Porty festival will take place in Portobello, a short way from Edinburgh. As usual, the festival features an eclectic programme of contemporary art, with the focus on walking, participating and live arts, with ambitious, compelling commissioned work, especially on the theme of art and the environment, by local and international artists.

2023’s theme is VESSEL, highlighting Portobello’s coastal ecologies and industrial histories – connected to questions concerning drought, climate resilience and climate-induced migration, with commissioned work at sixteen local coastal locations, connecting down the East Lothian coast from Seafield wastewater treatment plant to Aberlady nature reserve.

The twenty commissioned artists include Claudia Zeiske, whose work Slow Coast 500 culminates on Friday 1st September when she arrives at Portobello, as part of her 500-mile coastal walk from Dunnet Head to Berwick-upon-Tweed.

One of the most popular features of the festival is the Art Houses programme – the opportunity to visit artists’ homes and studios, this year on both weekends (2nd – 3rd Sept and 9th – 10th Sept), with participating 38 artists at 28 venues. One example is local painter Sarah Knox, whose work is pictured above (53 Windsor Place, Portobello, open 11am – 5pm). Sarah will be talking about her current project Adventures in Colour and giving demonstrations, both Sundays at 3pm.

Other participating artists include Finnish artist Henna Asikainen, composer Erland Cooper, with boat sculpture by Jenny Pope, with the central VESSEL exhibition at the Art Walk hub (189 Portobello High Street), open both festival weekends.

A film night, Afloat curated by Rosy Naylor, screens short artists’ films exploring ideas around environmental change and our relationship to the landscape, outdoors on Portobello Promenade including film by Kathy Hinde (whose River Traces is pictured below), Joanne Matthews, Julia Parks, Zoe Paterson Macinnes and Aymen Zedani.