Critics' choice

ART

STEPHEN SHANKLAND

Stephen Shankland, the northeast artist who won first prize in the 2004 BP Portrait Award in London, will be exhibiting a selection of limited-edition prints as part of LOOK 2005, Aberdeen's inaugural visual arts festival.

A graduate of the city's Gray's School of Art, he specialises in paintings of pensive figures absorbed in some unknown narrative. Composition, draughtsmanship and colour all contribute to the story unfolding in each scene. Figures gaze from their world with telling looks, often sharing the composition with objects that have symbolic relevance. This is encapsulated in the portrait of his wife and child, entitled The Miracle, which won the BP Portrait awards last year.

His wife Kelly Anne Cairns, also a graduate of Gray's School of Art - as well as a regular exhibitor in London and New York - will be exhibiting at the festival too, showcasing her love for fabric designs and textures.

Elsewhere on the bill, a host of national and international artists will participate through art projects located across the city. This will include Rainbow, a light sculpture installation by Jim Buckley in Marischal College; Art Box by Professor Jonathan Woolf in the city centre, examining the relationship between tradition and innovation; and Gangrel Bodies by Glasgow-based artist Jim Colquhoun, exploring the artist's engagement with the Salvation Army Citadel where he will camp during the festival.

Stephen Shankland will exhibit at Bridgeview, Aberdeen; LOOK 2005 - Art and the City, Aberdeen (01224-522 000), various venues, until June 24

CLASSICAL

GET ORGANISED

If the success of Glasgow's Oran Mor's A Play, A Pie and A Pint theatre series is anything to go by, then the lunch hour is a great time for attracting a new audience and capitalising on your existing one. Where Glasgow is focusing on a theatre audience, Edinburgh is turning its attentions to all things classical, with the third year of the Usher Hall's Get Organised programme. Held between 1pm and 2pm, and a relative snip at £3 a session, audiences are invited to short lunchtime concert recitals showcasing the Usher Hall's organ, with each concert presented from the stage in an enjoyable informal manner by a selection of musicians. Drag yourself away from your desk and take a cultural time-out.

Usher Hall, Edinburgh (0131-228 1155), Tuesday, 1.10pm

COMEDY

BRENDAN BURKE

Alleging a previous career as a microbiologist working in Baghdad, Irish comedian Brendan Burke is never short of a tale to tell, and not all of them are about Saddam Hussein either. As arguably one of the finest funny men from the Emerald Isle, Burke is a regular face on Irish television, as well as a compere in the comedy clubs of his native Dublin. Already a crowd favourite at venues across the country, Burke's laid-back banter on all things from the drinking habits of his native folk to whatever happened in the news that day makes him a surefire winner for a night of gentle, topical comedy fun.

Burke is joined by fellow comics Ray Peacock and Bill Bruce, with resident compere Susan Morrison taking the helm on Friday night and Stand regular Jane Mackay putting the boys through their paces on Saturday.

The Stand, Glasgow (0870 600 6055), Friday & Saturday, 7.30pm

FESTIVAL

BORDERS BOOK FESTIVAL

The literary word continues to make its presence felt in Scotland this week, hot on the heels of Word 05 last month, with the opening of the Borders Book Festival.

This year's impressive line-up boasts headline act and former Monty Python funnyman Michael Palin, who will chart his travels from Everest to the Eildons.

Social and political commentator and she of The Female Eunuch fame, Germaine Greer, will be discussing her 2003 literary effort The Beautiful Boy.

The late great actor John Thaw will be remembered by his widow Sheila Hancock, who will discuss The Two of Us, the emotional memoir of her life with Thaw, who died of cancer in 2002.

Additional events during the festival feature Barry Cunliffe, James Naughtie, Norman Davies, Roy Hattersley, Lady Claire Macdonald, Tom Pow and Ross Collins.

Various venues, Melrose (0870-6080404), Thursday until Sunday, times vary

FILM

LONDON LESBIAN AND GAY FILM FESTIVAL

The history of gay film stretches almost as far back as cinema itself, and just like mainstream film it has diversified and evolved with the times, featuring more sophisticated storylines and complex characters with every flaw and foible imaginable.

The late Nineties and early Noughties brought an increasing confidence and creativity in tackling disturbing and difficult subjects through conventional narrative drama and experimental work - films such as The Crying Game, The Talented Mr Ripley and more recently Boys Don't Cry being some of the best examples.

Edinburgh's Filmhouse is helping to celebrate these accomplishments by hosting the British Film Institute's 19th London Lesbian and Gay Film Festival on tour this week.

Events kick off with two German films: Marco Kreuzpaintner's Sommersturm (Summer Storm) and Franziska Meletzky's Nachbarinnen (Wanted!), a character-driven drama of two forty-something women falling in love.

Family drama Cachorro (Bear Cub), the story of a gay man left to look after his abandoned nephew, comes from Spanish director Miguel Albaladejo.

From the States there is Angela Robinson's teen spy spoof, D.E.B.S. Robinson will perhaps be better known this summer as a result of her other film, Herbie: Fully Loaded, starring Hollywood's hottest teen actress, Lindsay Lohan.

For something a little different, sexpots Gina Gershon and Lori Petty star in Alex Steyermark's Prey for Rock & Roll, based on the autobiographical musical by LA singer-songwriter and tattoo artist Cheri Lovedog.

Documentaries come courtesy of Brit-flick, Andrew and Jeremy Get Married and Sonia Slutsky's Drag Kings on Tour, following six handsome drag kings on their 15-city, 21-day tour across the US.

Filmhouse, Edinburgh (0131-228 2688), Wednesday until June 27, times vary

JAZZ
DIONNE WARWICK

Dionne Warwick's 40-year career has established her as a musical legend. From her first hit in 1962, 'Don't Make Me Over', Warwick (below) went on to become the first African-American solo female artist of her generation to win the prestigious award for Best Contemporary Female Vocal Performance at the Grammy Awards in 1968 for the classic hit 'Do You Know The Way to San Jose?' The award had only ever been bestowed on one other female African-American, Ella Fitzgerald.

With a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, the singer continues to work with various organisations dedicated to empowering others. In 1997 she was awarded the Luminary Award by the American Society of Young Musicians. That same year she joined General Colin Powell in celebrating the 10th anniversary of the Best Friends Program, an abstinence and character-building programme for young women.

By 2003 the singer had diversified further, launching her own skincare products and fragrance before writing her first book, My Point of View, the following year.

This week the mighty chanteuse headlines as part of the Glasgow Jazz Festival.

Clyde Auditorium, Glasgow (0141-552 3552), Wednesday, 8pm

ROCK
U2

It is surely a testament to U2's extraordinary talents that the band has survived despite Bono's burgeoning ambition to be thought of as an international peacekeeper. While the worthy one can only be commended for his fine words and actions, you still can't beat him when it comes to giving an all-out live rock'n'roll performance either.

From the post-punk sound of their early records through to the messianic ballads and genre-exploding pop-rock-dance music that came afterwards, the band have continued to produce emotionally stunning music, maintaining their own unique sound at every turn.

In 2000, the band made a spectacular return to form with the release of their three-times platinum album All That You Can't Leave Behind, with singles such as 'Beautiful Day', 'Stuck in a Moment You Can't Get Out Of' and 'Elevation' striking a chord with fans worldwide. Last year's album, How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb, cemented U2's place as legends of the music scene.

This is a band who were born to do things in style. The rockers play Hampden before taking part in the Live 8 concerts next month.

Hampden Park, Glasgow, Tuesday, 8pm

THEATRE

PETRA

David Greig is a playwright who manages to be prolific without ever losing sight of quality in his work. The man responsible for such plays as the award-winning The Cosmonaut's Last Message to the Woman He Once Loved in the Former Soviet Union and who was also writer and co-director of San Diego, which was performed as part of Edinburgh International Festival, sits firmly as one of our most important contemporary writers.

This week, one of his past works, Petra - the story of a soldier, a witch and a tinker helping a young woman to explain to her son why he is now a ghost - is revisited as part of the Glasgow West End Festival. Originally commissioned by TAG Theatre Company in 1996 for work in Glasgow schools, the piece represents an ambitious attempt to introduce complex questions about identity and conflict raised by the war in former Yugoslavia.

It is a well-imagined and keenly observed piece of theatre produced here by Measureless Liars.

Gilmorehill, Glasgow (0141-330 5522), Thursday until Saturday, 7.30pm