Forming part of the Northern Lights Dumfries trail, immersive light installations are set to be an art-highlight of the 2026 Big Burns Supper.
The expanded Northern Lights programme this year features 16 free light and sound installations across Dumfries, in a refreshed format for the Big Burns Supper – a cultural, artistic and community celebration of immersive storytelling, accessibility, public engagement and the preservation of intangible cultural heritage, and the world’s biggest festival celebrating national poet Robert Burns.
Running from 15th – 17th January, Phanto Spectra is set to transform the banks of the River Nith into an immersive, auditory exploration of Dumfries’ cultural connection with folk who mount travelling shows and fairs. Created by artist Martin Joseph O’Neill, the work promises visitors to ‘an evocative blend of sound, scenic design, storytelling and place-based memory’, and draws on five centuries of Showpeople heritage, using sound and theatrical sleight-of-hand to reveal hidden stories and celebrate the remarkable cultural contributions of travelling fairs.
Taking place in Dumfries, the Big Burns Supper enjoys an audience in excess of 26,000 and is the largest event in the south of Scotland, bringing together 5,000 participants each year in a six-month programme of creativity, and mixes cabaret, comedy, music and entertainment in venues across the town, and takes in the Dumfries Carnival* and Northern Lights Dumfries, one of Scotland’s largest community events, including a five-day Winter Food & Drink Village in the heart of the High Street, and Burns Light, a new historical retelling of the poet’s life in a newly-created music and light presentation bringing the Burns Mausoleum ‘to life’.
Further highlights include Divided – an art piece using mirrors to recreate an exterior world inside an abandoned nightclub, Washing Line, which will transform Gass House Close with an installation bringing forgotten voices back to life, a new installation Birds on a Wire, which will act as the Festival’s centrepiece on the High Street, allowing participants to ‘interact with birds who have visited the town centre by sitting on a telephone wire’, and Biofluorescence – a new interactive projected silent disco experience bringing to life Scotland’s sole rain forest.
Lights of Hope will form part of the lighting-up of the promenade and town centre spaces by Dumfries Partnership Action Group, while Norway Haus celebrates the town’s Norwegian connection during the second world war; Immortal Memory is an immersive experience at Greyfriars Church, allowing spectators to light candles, and numerous buildings will have their windows lit-up, including the recently-renovated Ewart Library, and Dumfries Table Tennis Club will be offering young people the chance to play glow-in-the-dark table tennis.
Running through the festival on Saturday 17th Jan, Dumfries Carnival will include a cast of over 2,000 members of the local community dressed-up, dancing and bearing lanterns, with this year’s theme being outer space, and the first moon landing. A special Burns Night edition of lively musical presentation Le Haggis concludes the Festival on 25th Jan.
