We’ll Miss EU

United Kingdom

“Cultural collaboration is central to Scotland’s open international cultural outlook and EU membership is a crucial part of this. Currently artists from around the EU work in Scotland, join our performing companies and enhance Scotland’s culture and creative sector. EU citizens travel freely to experience our unique culture and world leading festivals. Unfortunately, the UK Government’s approach to Brexit offers little reassurance for those worried about the impact that leaving the EU will have. – Fiona Hyslop, Cabinet Secretary for Culture, Tourism and External Affairs, Scottish Government

Germany

“For us as independent artists the access to a festival that has always been a home for boundary-pushing and radical art that questions the society we live in, becomes more difficult” –bambule.babys, performance collective

Belgium

Cold Blood, at the EIF, is a multimedia collabora tion between dancer and choreograper Michèle Anne De Mey and filmmaker Jaco Van Dormael.

Portugal

“Like most of our drinking sessions, Brexit feels like the ultimate hangover for a night we wish had never happened.” – Darias Tabai from Wishful Drinking

Ireland

“Looking at the positive side I can only hope, given everything that we have in common, that the ties between our two nations grow stronger.” – Ryan Murphy, Irish musician with folk band Ímar

Netherlands

“Many comedians we meet in Edinburgh are invited to perform in the Netherlands. It would be a shame to lose that connection!” – Dutch comedian Lisanne Fridsma

Austria

Austrian comic Alice Frick now lives in London, where she organises a monthly comedy show, Laughing Labia

Luxembourg

The Théâtres de la Ville de Luxembourg are producing no less than four works at this year’s EIF. Quite an output for a nation of 600,000 people.

It’s got to be the Institut Français in Scotland’s annual showcase, Vive le Fringe! ifecosse.org.uk.

Italy

Spain

“Since the Brexit vote, the responses to my act have been like a Spanish FIESTA & SIESTA: FIESTA (when Brexit jokes land) and SIESTA (when they don’t).” – Spanish comedian Sonia Aste

“No more I love yous. We heard there’ll be a pop music embargo: it will be possible to lipsync Annie Lennox’s songs only after express authorisation of the Queen.” – Nina’s Drag Queens

Finland

There’s more Finland than you can shake an antler at in the (brilliantly named) Finnish showcase, starttofinnish.fi

Sweden

“The most diplomatic way to put it is that Brexit surely won’t help in any way” – Patrik Ågren, producer of Let’s Inherit the Earth

Lithuania

Denmark

What says Denmark more than stories about Vikings? Well, lots of things. But Svend-Erik Engh’s stories in Walk the Oars are, nonetheless, thoroughly Danish.

Slovakia

Slovakian baritone Dalibor Jenis, who is currently playing the lead in Rigoletto at the Sydney Opera House, has performed at the EIF twice.

Poland

“Brexit has given us an awful lot of material, so: we’re taking our cultural differences, our sense of humour and popping it all in a brand new show, Clingfilm” – Lilly Pollard (UK), Izabella Malewska (Poland) and Tutku Barbaros (Turkey), from Plunge Theatre

Slovenia

Slovenia is probably the main reason France, not Scotland, won the world cup in Russia this summer. The 2-2 draw in Ljubljana punted Scotland out of the qualifiers in October last year. Robert Snodgras’s late equaliser just wasn’t enough.

Croatia

Just like Edinburgh, Croatia has its own international arts festival, the Dubrovnik Summer Festival.

Cyprus

Talk about imagining a world beyond borders: Forbidden Stories is a joint Greek-Turkish collab oration focussing on the separation of the island.

Greece

“I left Greece hoping I’d never in my life encounter a government full of incompetent, infighting idiots. But the way Brexit is being handled, it feels like I am back in Greece – only the weather is worse and I have to pay £8 for a kebab” – Greek comedian George Zacharopoulos

“Europe is vastly diverse in terms of traditions, perspectives and talent. Recent political decisions made on the international level seem to suggest that the idea of sharing the uniqueness of our communities is losing its value.” – Kristupas Liubinas, To Have Done With the Judgement of God

Latvia

Edinburgh’s Georgian masterpiece, the New Town, was built partly with timber imported from Riga.

Estonia

Over at the Book Festival, Estonian Andrei Ivanov teams up with Polish writer Jacek Dehnel to talk about their novels based on the reach of the Soviet regime.

Czech Republic

Jakub Hrůša conducts Dvořák Requiem at the EIF with the Bamberger Symphoniker this year.

Bulgaria

Want to know what happens when a Bulgarian musician has a mid-life crisis? The Burning Gadulka is the show for you.

Romania

“Much of our work comes from producers attending fringes and most of it from Edinburgh as the freedom of movement brings so many potential employers” - Iulia Benze from Bubble Show: Milkshake and the Bubble Flower

Hungary

Scotland once had a Hungarian queen. Born into the Hungarian court, Margaret married Malcolm III, becoming Queen of Scots in 1070. She established the ferry to take pilgrims between Edinburgh and Fife, the original Queensferry crossing.

Sir Walter Scott’s last novel, written on his deathbed and unpublished until 2008, is The Seige of Malta. It was inspired by his own trip to Malta in 1831 on doctors’ orders. It didn’t work – Scott died in 1832.