6 March – 7 June 2026
Online
David John Scarborough’s digital installation follows a mythic family and a host of animal voices on a pilgrim’s journey through ecology, kinship, and burial. Staged across videoworks, soundtracks and virtual worlds, Earth-Stepper presents a series of digital dioramas informed by personal loss and climate renewal. The exhibition considers virtual space not as a site of escapism, but as a place of lament and reconnection in which to imagine an inclusive, alternative British folk tradition.
David presented an interactive virtual reality world that invites audiences on a mythopoetic journey. The world is composed of wetlands, gardens and burial mounds housing texts and sounds that take shape as guests navigate through space.
Stemming from a folktale with contemporary resonance, the story follows a mother and son as they carry a father’s body back to his homeland. Unable to enter, they bury him outside the gates with three seeds in his mouth, from which a forest grows.
The story branches out through songs and screens, invoking videogame walkthroughs and electronic folk tunes. Across the multiscreen installation, beetles rejoice, butterflies grieve and rabbits tell tales, rekindling the Old English wordhoard — a shared reservoir of story and song, carried forward by the community.
Earth-Stepper was developed with Morphē Arts, Near Now, New Media Art Club, Nottingham Trent University and Six Minutes Past Nine. This project was undertaken by the artist as part of their practice-led research at Modern Painters, New Decorators, supported by Arts Council England. An in-person presentation of Earth-Stepper was hosted by Haarlem Artspace from 6 February – 1 March 2026 in the run up to an online presentation with Fermynwoods Contemporary Art from 6 March – 7 June 2026.
David John Scarborough is a British-Australian artist based in Charnwood, East Midlands. His practice navigates the desire lines between technology, ecology, and music, drawing from autobiography, heritage, and natural history. He creates environments that integrate multidimensional narratives, visuals, and sounds to explore the knotty relationships between language and land. From video games set in underground forests to visual albums crafted from samples and stock footage, each project functions as a living archive that reimagines a more generous British folk tradition through stories and songs. He has exhibited with Phoenix (Leicester), LCB Depot (Leicester), Fermynwoods Contemporary Art (Northamptonshire), Contemporary Sculpture Fulmer (Slough), Turf Projects (Croydon) and BACKLIT (Nottingham). He has undertaken research and residencies with New Media Art Club, Six Minutes Past Nine and Nottingham Trent University. He is also the team leader and curator at Modern Painters, New Decorators, Loughborough.
Images: Earth-Stepper – David John Scarborough, 2026. Outdoor photography by Joshua Jones