Karen Brummund’s Performing Harmony

As part of a spring 2023 residency sponsored by the Foundation for Spirituality and the Arts, Alabama artist Karen Brummund worked closely with the people of Grace Church Cathedral in Charleston, South Carolina, to create a projected video installation inside and around the church called Performing Harmony.

Charleston is just one stop on a tour of this evolving installation, which brings together Brummund’s signature interests in architectural forms and communal interaction—applied here within a sacred space for the first time in her creative career.

Performing Harmony begins with what she calls a community build, whereby members of the congregation generate together the raw materials used in the production of the final piece. Drawing, coloring, assembling, and stacking paper blocks as a group at this coordinated event, Brummund and the congregation occupy a designated space in dialogue with each other, building community while literally building in community.