I wanted to arrange the poppies as a cascade taking in the clinic, the soldiers attending and some of the text taking from my Grandmother's autograph book which contains anecdotes and messages of gratitude towards her. This little book was in use 107 years ago and captures the sentiments and experiences of the soldiers she helped to care for. The photo of the clinic in Exeter captures a moment in time and somehow I wanted to bring these factors together.
I felt this image of the clinic and the soldiers' sentiments somehow needed to be conjoined, I experimented with some reverse applique to cut a poppy shape out of the clinic photo [trying this with paper first] to reveal some of the soldiers' handwriting underneath. I have selected samples of handwriting which are clear and in best condition, I took care to find samples which gave details of the time and place e.g. date and location. I then tried placing the 'cut out' image amongst the poppy cascade. I followed this with poppy shapes taking in oak leaf patterns and more soldiers' handwriting.
I love the cascading effect so familiar to us and representative of remembrance whilst pleasing to the composition.
The next stage was to translate this into fabric:
This detail shows the layering of components - the machine stitched oak leaf pattern beneath the sample of handwriting, the image of the clinic and finally the cascade of poppies. My mother also found the beautiful photo of my Grandmother which sits comfortably amongst the poppies. I have surrounded the reverse applique with red free machine stitched satin stitch [Sian's suggestion - thank you] to represent how devotedly these soldiers were cared for and nurtured. Each poppy is secured with a snap fastener and secured by stitching these to the backing fabric which gives a 3D effect.
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