Wael Shawky explores a theatrical moment in history in Edinburgh

Talbot Rice Gallery sits in the centre of Edinburgh, and is soon to be flooded by almost half a million visitors attending the annual Edinburgh International Festival (1-24 August). The gallery is participating in the festival for the first time with its new exhibition by artist Wael Shawky, who has just been announced as the artistic director of the inaugural edition of Art Basel Qatar, in 2026. His eight-part opera, Drama 1882 (2024), was one of the most popular works at the Venice Biennale 2024, and spans the mediums of film, music, drawing, puppetry and performance, exploring moments in history with a focus on Egypt and the Middle East.

His trilogy of films, The Cabaret Crusades, which arguably made him famous, explores events during the Christian Crusades in the Middle East, the narratives acted out by glass marionettes who speak and sing their way through historical happenings (the first film covers 1096-1099; the second, 1099- 1149). By presenting the past in this way, Shawky raises questions about events we are living through today, offering an often-missing context for relationships between the West, Egypt and the Middle East.

At Talbot Rice (until 28 September 2025), he is presenting the third film in this trilogy, The Secrets of Karbala (2015) – rooted in the period between the Second and Third Crusades in the 12th century – with Drama 1882, which explores the events of the Urabi revolt (1879-1882) against the British colonial power in Egypt. Set 700 years apart, these works raise many questions.

‘Both films speak about a shift that's happening in the Middle East and in Egypt,’ says Shawky. ‘Both of them show this theatrical moment in history and ask how we can deal with history, as if it's staged. It is not about conspiracy, it's more about the possibility of being cheated. There is this possibility of a set-up.’

The sense in both of these films, that events are set in motion through deception, or a lack of understanding, is thrown into relief by the lack of trust there is in the media today. Almost every historical moment can feel like a sleight of hand. Looking back at events in this way highlights how little has changed and how much remains unresolved.

‘This possibility of being cheated – and of a different type of analysis, because history is human creation – [prompts us to ask] what we know about history, and how we can transform this […] into a new, readable format,’ continues the artist.

The muted colours and the exaggerated, almost cuddly caricatures of the puppets take us somewhere else, and the sound and lure of the glass figures are transfixing. The Secrets Of Karbala is a two-hour epic that traces the history leading up to the Venetian attack on Constantinople (in 1204), and takes in the lust for power and money that led to events that then seemed unthinkable.

Both films are musical, and while we are carried along in their aesthetic beauty and the singing, we are transported in time and place. Drama 1882 features adult actors rather than puppets, or children, as in other of Shawky's works, and is no less transfixing than The Secrets of Karbala.

‘Three is the connection between both of them, then the connection of time and my own development,’ says the artist. ‘When I work with adults, I learned a lot from my experience with marionettes – human, marionette, they’re all hypnotised, they're all manipulated by something.’

In Edinburgh, the films are shown alongside the marionettes from The Secrets of Karbala, each glass puppet dressed in its costume. These objects, made in Murano to embody Venice’s role in the story, are shown suspended from their strings, in a rare opportunity to see them up close. They are shown alongside drawings and mixed-media works, lesser-seen aspects of Shawky’s practice.

‘I compose only for my films and for me, really,’ he says of his musical elements. ‘Let's consider music as a medium; I don't give it more space than it should have. I think anyone can make art. I think it is all these things that are inside of us; I really believe in what Joseph Beuys said – that everyone is an artist.’

The most powerful thing about Shawky’s work is how it evolves in the ever-changing context of the present. In a matter of weeks, Edinburgh will be filled with visitors from all over the world. Shawky feels that in presenting this work, questioning the status quo of the institution it sits in is one of the strongest aspects of the exhibition.

‘I produced three parts of Cabaret Crusades, showing the Crusades story from the Arab point of view,’ he says. ‘I produced one in Italy, one in France, one in Germany. Let's say these [countries] are the main forces behind the Crusades, right? That, for me, is something extremely positive, that Europe is [willing] to talk about its own history, even if it's bloody, if it's not correct. I think it's also extremely positive that we're able as human beings to talk about everything. It's very important that you try to see this idea that it's not that history is repeating itself, but history is happening like this today because 1,000 years ago, something happened that will never disappear.’

Wael Shawky at Talbot Rice until 28 September 2025, trg.ed.ac.uk