Luke Jerram's spectacular Gaia goes on display at Durham Cathedral

Luke Jerram’s touring Gaia installation has landed at the historic site, with the seven-metre wide piece aimed at sparking important conversations about how we care for the planet and tackling climate change.

The striking piece has been created using detailed images of the Earth’s surface, taken by NASA.

As the artwork slowly revolves, you will see the whole planet floating in three dimensions, illuminating the world class architecture of the iconic cathedral.

A specially-made surround sound composition by BAFTA award-winning composer Dan Jones is played alongside.

It follows Luke Jerram’s Museum of the Moon piece, that the cathedral hosted in 2021, which saw visitor numbers rocket.

Reverend Canon Charlie Allen said: “Artworks like this bring a huge amount of new people in. Part of our core purpose of being is hospitality and welcome, so we are utterly thrilled to welcome everybody who comes and to instil a sense in them that this is their cathedral: it belongs not to us, it belongs to all of us.

"So if you haven’t been before, come and visit your cathedral, it’s here for you, and come and rejoice in this wonderful artwork while you’re here.”

The cathedral is hosting a programme of earth-themed events to accompany Gaia including sustainable Dinners under the Earth with Chester-le-Street based community café REfUSE, yoga classes and silent discos.

One of the highlights will be Gaia Lates, a series of late-night openings offering visitors the chance to see the installation after-hours.

These select summer evenings will have a festival-feel and feature street food, music, live entertainment and hands on activities - from kombucha making to floristry workshops and poetry writing - each week will be slightly different.

Whilst all events will have an eco-friendly theme, a series of talks and debates on climate change and climate justice will also take place.

Reverend Canon Allen added: “It’s really exciting to see Gaia in place, we’ve been talking and planning for so long and here it is – and it really is as spectacular as we hoped it would be.

"We’ve got so many exciting things going on around Gaia and the silent disco is always a huge highlight. We also have various conversations going on, we have a live music event and quite a lot of evening late events, which are really fun to come along to and see it as it’s getting slightly darker outside so the earth stands out even more as it’s internally lit.

"We also have quite a few events going on to encourage us to think about our response to climate change. That’s one of the reasons we have Gaia in the cathedral at this time: firstly, to instil a sense of awe and wonder at the sheer joy of the world around us, but also to reflect on how we might need to live differently so that future generations can enjoy the earth as we have done.”

More details on the events here.

While some of the events are ticketed, Gaia is free to view, with a suggested donation of £5.

It will be on display until September 10.