From dark to dazzling: Hits of the Edinburgh Art Festival

Author Ian Rankin joins Kirsty Wark on a tour of the intriguingly titled exhibition The Scottish Endarkenment: Art and Unreason 1945 to the Present. Over 30 artists, from John Bellany and Douglas Gordon to David Shrigley and Alison Watt, are represented in this fascinating exploration of provocative and sometimes disturbing topics - from the out-and-out horrific to the darkly satirical. The Scottish Endarkenment is at Dovecot Studios until 29 August 2016. Watch more Edinburgh Nights: Angus Deayton and Richard Wilson, The Scottish Endarkenment, The Glass Menagerie and Dazzle.

Turner Prize-nominated artist Ciara Phillips’ Every Woman is the fourth in a series of contemporary ‘Dazzle’ ship designs to commemorate the First World War. This art of confusion transformed ships into an array of multi-directional shapes that made it difficult for German U-Boats to gauge a ship’s direction or speed. Phillips’ design honours women's contribution to the WWI war effort. Watch the ship's transformation in the timelapse video above. It has been announced that The Dazzle Ship's stay at Prince of Wales Dock, Leith has been extended into 2017.

With no less than three Edinburgh exhibitions showcasing his work, German painter, sculptor and performance artist Joseph Beuys is being comprehensively celebrated in Scotland’s capital city. Far from being a summer fling, Beuys and Edinburgh have a long association thanks to a Scottish ex-teacher turned gallery owner. In 1970, Richard Demarco met Beuys in West Germany and persuaded him to host his debut UK exhibition at the Edinburgh Festival. Read how this unlikely friendship helped transform British art. Richard Demarco & Joseph Beuys – A Unique Partnership is at the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art until 16 October. Joseph Beuys – A Language of Drawing is at the same gallery until 30 October. Joseph Beuys x 1000 is at Summerhall until 30 September.

Edinburgh Art Festival embraces the peculiar with Scotland’s largest ever exhibition of Surrealist art, Surreal Encounters – Collecting the Marvellous. Loved, derided, celebrated, and decried by the Nazis as 'degenerate', Surrealist art has long courted controversy. Featuring crowd-pleasers by Dali, Magritte, Picasso and Miro from four very different private collections, this exhibition celebrates the role of the collector as well as the works themselves. How did friendship, obsession, and conservation shape this unique exhibition? Surreal Encounters is at the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art until 11 September, before moving to the Hamburger Kunsthalle.