The cluster of galleries on Market and Cockburn Streets are, co­in­cid­ent­ally, all showing work about exploring worlds, private, public and ex­tra­ter­restri­al.

At Fruit­mar­ket, Janet Cardiff and George Bures Miller have turned the gallery into a Wun­der­kam­mer­ of immersive in­stal­l­a­tions, small but complete en­vir­on­ments for visitors to explore. Some are simple, like the specially-com­mis­sioned new work The House of Books Has No Windows, a fairy-tale cottage made of tales. A cute, miniature in­carn­a­tion of Borges’ Library of Babel, visitors are en­cour­aged to enter the tiny house. Once inside the dark, claus­tro­phobic Wendy house, the work makes use of the one sense that artists tend to ignore: smell. That dry, musty, mildewed scent of old paper and cloth is strong enough to catches in the back of the throat, prompting memories of opening a never-borrowed book from the library stacks, or rummaging for hours in second hand bookshops. After this simple, subtle piece, Opera for a Small Room is a bit of a shock. In a pitch black room, a plywood shed is packed to the gunnels with a vast record col­lec­tion, various dusty turnt­ables and vintage radios, and an array of speakers which blast a heady sound collage of field re­cord­ings, rock ‘n’ roll and opera, all overlaid with an unseen char­ac­ters memories of lost love. Upstairs, things take a turn toward the spooky, with The Dark Pool, a haunted attic space, with strange clanking noises emanating from stacked boxes, dis­em­bod­ied voices con­ver­s­ing through metal horns, and quasi-medical apparatus gargling with water.

Around the corner at the Col­lect­ive Gallery, artists and per­formers have gathered to explore outer space. The Golden Record project takes its name from the disc carried by the Voyager space­craft, packed with sounds and images designed to represent life on Earth to any aliens who might happen upon it. The 116 images of earth included, compiled by as­tro­nomer­ Carl Sagan, have been re­in­ter­preted by as many artists, inspired by the curious titles - Old Man with Beard and Glasses, Physical Unit De­fin­i­tions, Un­der­wa­ter­ Scene with Diver - rather than the original images. In the second gallery, grouped around the Car­pen­ters classic Calling Occupants of In­ter­plan­et­ary Craft and intended to replace the Golden Record’s recorded greetings in 55 languages, is a series of very short films, most by comedians, offering advice and in­struc­tions to the little green men. Topics include a history of sex toys, a guide to hair removal tech­n­iques, and musings on the evil of mobile ‘phones. The result is like spending an hour drifting around YouTube, but genuinely en­ter­tain­ing.

At Stills, a return to private, interior space. Instead of an ex­hib­i­tion, the gallery is housing a library of nigh on 8,000 books and per­i­od­ic­als from the col­lec­tion of New York artist and author Martha Rosler, which has been touring galleries since 2005. On one level, this is a new kind of self-portrait - there can be few things more personal, or more revealing than a col­lec­tion of books - but, in Edinburgh in August, it also offers an oasis of calm and quiet learning, a welcome antidote to the festivals that surround it.

The Golden Record is at The Col­lect­ive Gallery until 13 September, Janet Cardiff and Georges Bures Miller are at Fruit­mar­ket until 28 September and the Martha Rosler Library is at Stills until 9 November.

This review was first published in The Herald in August, 2008.