There are compensations for long dark nights.   Take a walk down Edinburgh’s Victoria Street and you will find a sudden blaze of coloured light that stops you in your tracks. Astrid Jaekel’s Curtain-Twitchers is a dazzling moment in winter darkness and that’s just what the artist intends. 

It was perhaps an extra, unexpected, treat for Hogmanay revellers on the way to or from games, perhaps, in Dancebase in the Grassmarket on New Year’s Day.

The four windows in India Buildings at the top of Victoria Street look like stained glass. But the glowing images are in fact paper cuts which first appeared in August 2011 for Edinburgh Festival. During Scotland’s long summer days it was at least 8pm before the images of Curtain Twitchers came to life: four elderly people watching the comings and goings in Victoria Street with quiet disapproval. Casting light, causing questions.

But on bleak midwinter days the city’s windows light up by 4pm. Or they did during the week before Christmas anyway. That’s the benefit of darkness, it’s a great opportunity for light. Which is exactly what Astrid Jaekel, studying for a Masters in Illustration at Edinburgh College of Art, is exploring with her recent experiments of large scale paper cuts. “As part of that, I have been lighting up my work in order to gain maximum impact during the hours of darkness”.

Now the solstice is past, we can look forward to days stretching out again but not until well after New Year. Enjoy the light shows while the dark lasts!

The words in Astrid Jaekel’s images are from Alan Bennett’s Lady of Letters played by Patricia Routledge in the BBC television series, Talking Heads.