Truro Cathedral: Luxmuralis, Time

 This event has now finished 

Luxmuralis events take place across the country.  If you follow them on facebook you can see what events they have coming up.  This the second year that Truro Cathedral has hosted a Luxmuralis display.  Last January we were lucky to see the amazing Space, so we had a pretty good idea what to expect.

The event lasted several nights but unfortunately we were unable to go during the week and ended up going early on the Saturday.  It was exceptionally busy.  The first few slots were completely sold out.  On arrival, they were managing access to the event by having people for each time slot queue in different queues and checking their tickets in advance.  The queue for our time slot then went in, in two halves.

Backtracking a little, we usually park in the Old Bridge Street car park and then take the path through the Cathedral car park, past the Chapter House.  Due to damage from Storm Goretti, we had to walk the long way this year, via High Cross.

There are five separate displays within the cathedral and you move around the cathedral in an anticlockwise direction.  You begin by walking along the south side aisle to the south transept.  This is where the two short arms of the cross form of the cathedral meet the main cathedral.  At this point you can look up to a display on your right or across the cathedral to the left for another display.  You will get a better view of the display to your right from the opposite side of the cathedral later on.

Looking to our left was a fairly short loop of clock faces moving and merging in several different colours.  This display was fit for a Timelord and you can imagine a Tardis swopping through the tunnel of clock faces.  I particularly appreciated that the largest clock faces had been centred over the round stained glass window.

Moving on round the cathedral, the next stop is St Mary's Aisle, a preserved part of the original parish church.  Although you may need to stand to begin with, there are chairs here for you to watch the next, longer film.  This film featured a series of images that moved and changed in to one another taking you on a trip back through time through different civilizations and movements.  Each segment would have a pattern from that civilization or movement and then a face from sculpture or art.  For instance when it reached the romans there were images of roman mosaics and then a sculpture of a head, I presume Caesar's, that then showed an image of his face.  There was a huge variety covered including different artists, all the way back to cave paintings.

At the cathedral there is an area behind the sanctuary which was where the next display was.  There were some seats here.  To move on, people had to walk into the projections though, so the seats were a few to the side and back.  This display looked at the concept of time in science and and literature.  So it featured many different scientific equations moving with quotes from scientist and from books in the background.  After the equations there were images from H G Wells book the Time Machine amongst others.  It then went full rainbow clocks before moving into purple psychedelia...

Moving on round the cathedral to the North transept you can look across to the other display visible at your first stop.  This one featured time going backwards again so that water drops fell in reverse, waterfalls, the lives of flowers and trees all flowed in reverse.

The last display is the main feature and the longest of them all.  It's also the busiest.  With your back to the sanctuary, you look along the main cathedral to the back.  It's a big space with arches along the sides and a vaulted ceiling and huge stained glass windows at the back.  The project plays across it all.  There are seats to the side, people sat on the floor, people stood at the back.

The projections flowed backwards but were more focused on culture and events than on art as in the second display.  From modern technology to images of Kitchener, the statue of liberty and the French revolution, to the evolution of different types of animals and back to skeletons of prehistoric animals.  The projection continued all the way back until the big bang.

And then, when you choose to leave, we went out through a side door at the end of the north aisle, by the old shop extension.

So what would I say about it....  it's stunning.  An absolute kaleidoscope of images and colours.  So many ideas...  It just washes over you.  It's impossible to take it all in.  The main display and the ones in the two transepts share a soundtrack while those at the back and in St Mary's Aisle have there own.  

There is a lot going on.  If you are likely to find this all a bit overwhelming, try and choose a quieter time, such as a later time on a weekday.  We found it a lot to deal with all the people and this absolutely would not be our choice of time in the future.  I would still go if this was the only slot we could manage in the future.  It's too beautiful to miss