Stunning ‘Luxmuralis’ to light up Durham Cathedral this autumn

Luxmuralis is a touring sound and light installation which will temporarily transform Durham Cathedral. Visitors will take a journey through earth, sea and sky with dazzling projections on the cathedral’s centuries-old architecture.

Thousands flock every two years to see Lumiere light up the cathedral’s exterior, but the festival will not return until 2023.

Instead Luxmuralis will bring the natural world to life and give people an opportunity to “pause and reflect on our responsibility to protect it”.

The project comes from a collaboration between composer David Harper and artist Peter Walker, who has interpreted collections from Oxford’s Natural History Museum and the William Morris Museum in London, depicting nature and highlighting the cathedral’s own architectural design.

Visitors to the cathedral will walk through and see individual light and sound art installations digitally and artistically. Viewers are immersed in the soundscapes they hear and walk through the projections around them.

The viewer is taken from sunrise to sunset through the beauty of planet Earth, witnessing the sun, the oceans and the clouds. The sounds and sights of “humanity, extinction and time” is shown.

Previous displays at St Albans Cathedral in Hertforshire attracted a great deal of praise from the public.

One visitor said: “I have been to a good number of Luxmuralis events now and they never fail to move me.

“Using the lofty and beautiful architecture of a Cathedral to tell human stories in light and sound in a place steeped in worship, it feels like a modern form of worship; a new way to connect with and nourish the spiritual self, whether that be in concert with one’s religious beliefs but also not requiring any in particular.

“It is beautiful, it is moving, it is thought-provoking, it is grounding, it is community-building, it is phenomenal art.”

Luxmuralis takes place at Durham Cathedral from Wednesday, October to Sunday October, 6.45pm to 9pm.

Tickets are £8 for an adult, £5 for children under 18 and £5 for wheelchair user and visitors with limited mobility. Carers and children under three can enter free. Tickets can be booked at www.durhamcathedral.co.uk/life.