CHRIS SEARLE recommends a work of love and deep admiration for a great musician
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When less is actually more
ANGUS REID discovers a choice exhibition of Alexander Zyw work - a Pole who adopted Edinburgh in the aftermath of WWII
(L to R) In Depth, 1948-9; The Dance c1948
[The Scottish Gallery]
KENNY MacASKILL relishes a fictionalised account of the life and death of the principled Irish anti-colonialist, executed for betraying his English imperial masters
FIONA O’CONNOR admires an ambitious first novel that loosens South Africa’s rainbow collective to examine the racial tensions within
Aussie mining corporation murder, Liverpudlian ex-cop amnesia, a naive vigilante tries to reset capitalism, and the riddle of the dead psychoanalyst
SYLVIA HIKINS is persuaded by an entertaining play that the true miracle of Lourdes would be for attitudes toward disability to change
JAMIE BRITTON recommends this fine analysis of the architectural, ecological and infrastructural destruction of the Gaza Strip
Alexander Zyw,
Before & After, work from 1934–1951
The Scottish Gallery, Edinburgh
THE most worthy of attention show in lockdown Edinburgh is also the most modest. A dozen paintings in a small room at the Scottish Gallery amount to an account of the impact of WWII on the soul, the mind and the canvas of a great modernist you have probably never heard of.
The artist is Alexander Zyw (1905–1995), who trained in pre-war Poland and who, by a series of accidents, lived in Edinburgh from 1941 – 1970.
He resided in France when Nazi Germany attacked, fought as machine gunner with Polish units. After defeat he escaped via Spain and then wangled the position of war artist with a Polish 1st armoured division based in Scotland.
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