Peace Doves …..

Today we make it as far as Liverpool. We’ve been wanting to see Peter Walker’s art installation ‘Peace Doves’ for some time, and as it’s in its final days, it really is a case of now or never. It’s in the Anglican Cathedral, a place we’ve visited before for carol services and for our eldest son’s graduation, but we’ve never really explored this mighty building. 


The beauty of the installation hits us as soon as we enter this vast space. A column of light descends along cords strung with 18 thousand white paper doves. Walking beneath it, I look up to the cathedral roof where varying shades of light transform the ribbon cords to filaments of light. It is stunningly beautiful, supplemented by the rainbows shining from the stained glass windows and accompanied by a meditative soundscape from composer David Harper.

This in itself is both awe inspiring and moving, but there is more. The floor of a side chapel houses the rope outline of a dove filled with thousands of brightly coloured buttons. Visitors are asked to bring a button with a link to a special person no longer in their lives - or to take one from the buttons left there. I take a bright yellow one, thinking of my niece who died last year, and place it carefully with the others. Along the alter rises a flight of yet more paper doves, each inscribed with messages written by local children or cathedral visitors. They express sadness at personal loss or hope for peace. This, appropriately, is called ‘Peace to Ourselves’.

And then there’s ‘Angel Wings’, a light installation which allows visitors to stand against the cathedral wall where they are transformed into angels. Little girls queue up excitedly, loving their new wings as parents photograph them proudly. 
 
Begun in 1904 and completed in 1978, Liverpool’s Anglican Cathedral prides itself as being built ‘by the people and for the people’. From today’s visit, it’s the sense of it being at the heart of a community that stays with us. It may be the largest cathedral in the UK and the eight largest in the world, but this seems hardly relevant. 


I know I often say it’s hard to choose my main, and today it’s even harder, so there are several extras! 


Thanks so much for your responses to my Carneddau mare yesterday - I’m sorry I’m behind with getting back to you all, and I’m afraid I’m yet to look at journals. I think today’s excursion’s really taken it out of me!