Erdkunde means ‘geography’ in German. However, its literal translation is more poetic, translating as 'messages brought by the earth.'

In the Romantic period, Erdkunde had a mystical meaning, in opposition to the quantifying sciences of the Enlightenment. The concept conveyed the process of listening to these tidings from the Earth in a very specific moment and place. The word emphasises the local: every bit of the world has its own specific tiding to communicate. These tidings inform us about who we are, where we come from, and where we are headed.

As a provocation to listen to the earth’s tidings about our climate, a pair of avatars and a series of demons have been developed to listen to the tidings in the Scottish peatlands by measuring the critical zone, the near-surface environment of rock, soil, water and air. The avatars and demons will, depending on the results of their measuring/listening, personify the results as emotions of celebration (smiling, laughing, cheering) or of distress (crying, screaming, spitting blood). The avatars are used as crofts, a unique tenure to Scotland, with programmes that aid in the restoration and preservation of the peatland as a carbon sink.