Exclusive:Arts diary: Late Fringe dates leave artists with accommodation headache at official digs

For those staying in the student halls at Queen Margaret University (QMU), it has emerged a lease for a full Fringe run actually finishes two days before the last day of the festival, leaving some artists who had signed up to a full run forced to either cancel their last couple of shows - or scrabble around for another room for their final days in Edinburgh.

Queen Margaret University (QMU), which offers 600 rooms of “affordable” accommodation for Fringe performers in partnership with the Edinburgh Festival Fringe Society, is only offering leases until 30 August - the day before the end of the festival - ahead of students returning to campus for the new academic term.

The Fringe is running later than usual this year, from 7 to 31 August.

One performer has had to cut short his planned run by two days due to a lack of accommodation, potentially losing his company more than £2,000 in income.

Alex Howarth tells me he had originally booked a full three week run with Summerhall for his show, You and Me (And Whoever Comes Next). The play stars Keron Day, a wheelchair user who has cerebral palsy, leaving QMU as one of few accessible options and making it impossible for the group to move to another location for the last two days.

He says: “We were supposed to be going up until right until the end, but then QMU told us that we have to get out early, so we've had to cut the last two days.”

Another performer, Alex Love, had assumed the dates printed on the QMU registration form had been inaccurate when he had booked.

Alex, who has been bringing his comedy show, How to Win A Pub Quiz, to the Fringe since 2014, received an email from the university telling him 30 August was the “latest possible checkout date” it could provide “as many of our university students will be returning after this date”. He is to perform at Gilded Saloon from 7 to 31 August.

“There's two nights when we're effectively left in limbo and I’m going to have to find something else,” he says. “At the end of the Fringe, I'm normally exhausted and just struggling to stay upright at the best of times, but just having having to move all my stuff out of my accommodation and change places is frustrating.

“The Fringe gets more expensive every year, and it's just adding to the cost.”

A spokeswoman for QMU says it needs to end the Fringe rental date on 30 August “in order to prepare flats for our returning QMU students at the start of the new academic year”.

A spokesman for the Fringe Society adds it would “recommend to any artists booking accommodation that they guarantee alignment between their accommodation booking dates and their performance run.”

Moral of the story: always read the small print.

Riverbank exhibition tour

Highland photographer Ed Smith is currently in the middle of a tour of his work on the River Spey.

Currently at the Eleven41 Gallery in Kingussie, Ed is showcasing the work he carried out a year ago during a 10-day open canoe expedition. Each venue is hosting the exhibition for up to three weeks, with Ed also delivering talks and workshops at each location.