Remembrance

by J McCombie

Title

Remembrance

Artist

J McCombie

Medium

Drawing - Soft Pastel Drawing

Description

This piece has been featured in the FAA Groups, "Beautiful Poppies", "Artist News" and "Beautiful Flowers ...".
This piece is also available in sepia, as well as in collages containing sepia, pop art colours or black and white.
Flanders Poppies are seen sprinkling cornfields with its bright scarlet red flowers. Ideal for creating a bright splash of colour in a sunny corner where little else will grow, or in the wild garden where it self seeds with ease. Flowers early summer. Height: 18-24 inches. Ideal for cottage gardens, wildlife gardens, cut flower garden. Flowers, June, July, August, September, October.
Wild Poppy ... Papaver rhoeas (common names include corn poppy, corn rose, field poppy, Flanders poppy, red poppy, red weed, coquelicot, and, due to its odour, which is said to cause them, as headache and headwark) is a herbaceous species of flowering plant in the poppy family, Papaveraceae. This poppy, a native of Europe, is notable as an agricultural weed (hence the "corn" and "field") and as a symbol of fallen soldiers.
Papaver rhoeas is a variable, erect annual, forming a long-lived soil seed bank that can germinate when the soil is disturbed. In the northern hemisphere it generally flowers in late spring, but if the weather is warm enough other flowers frequently appear at the beginning of autumn. It grows up to about 70cm in height. The flowers are large and showy, 50 to 100mm across, with four petals that are vivid scarlet red, most commonly with a black spot at the base of each petal which forms a cross which is tipped and contrasted in pure white. The flower stem is usually covered with coarse hairs that are held at right angles to the surface. The capsules are hairless soft green, accented with burgundy wine red, darker green and golden yellow stripes and is obovoid in shape, less than twice as tall as they are wide, with a black stigma coated in green pollen at least as wide as the capsule. Like many other species of Papaver, the plant exudes white to yellowish latex when the tissues are broken.
Its origin is not known for certain. As with many such plants, the area of origin is often ascribed by Americans to Europe, and by northern Europeans to southern Europe. The European Garden Flora suggests that its origin is Eurasia and North Africa; in other words, the lands where agriculture has been practiced since the earliest times. It is known to have been associated with agriculture in the Old World since early times and has had an old symbolism and association with agricultural fertility. It has most of the characteristics of a successful weed of agriculture. These include an annual lifecycle that fits into that of most cereals, a tolerance of simple weed control methods, the ability to flower and seed itself before the crop is harvested, and the ability to form a long-lived seed bank. The leaves and latex have an acrid taste and are mildly poisonous to grazing animals.
The use of the poppy was inspired by the poem "In Flanders Fields", one of the most frequently quoted English-language poems composed during the First World War. Its opening lines refer to the many poppies that were the first flowers to grow in the churned-up earth of soldiers' graves in Flanders, a region of Europe that overlies parts of Belgium and France. The poem was written by Canadian physician and Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae on 3 May 1915 after witnessing the death of his friend, a fellow soldier, the day before. The poem was first published on 8 December 1915 in the London-based magazine Punch. The remembrance poppy (a Papaver rhoeas) has been used since 1920 to commemorate soldiers who have died in war.
They were first used by the American Legion to commemorate American soldiers who died in that war (19141918). In 1918, American YWCA worker Moina Michael, inspired by the poem, published a poem of her own called "We Shall Keep the Faith". In tribute to McCrae's poem, she vowed to always wear a red poppy as a symbol of remembrance for those who served in the war. At a November 1918 YWCA Overseas War Secretaries' conference, she appeared with a silk poppy pinned to her coat and distributed 25 more to those attending. She then campaigned to have the poppy adopted as a national symbol of remembrance. At a conference in 1920, the National American Legion adopted it as their official symbol of remembrance. At this conference, Frenchwoman Anna E. Gun was inspired to introduce the artificial poppies commonly used today. In 1921 she sent her poppy sellers to London, where they were adopted by Field Marshal Douglas Haig, a founder of the Royal British Legion. It was also adopted by veterans' groups in Canada, Australia and New Zealand. They were then adopted by military veterans' groups in parts of the former British Empire: the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. Today, they are mainly used in the UK and Canada to commemorate their servicemen and women who have been killed in all conflicts since 1914. There, small artificial poppies are often worn on clothing for a few weeks until Remembrance Day/Armistice Day (11 November). Poppy wreaths are also often laid at war memorials.

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October 4th, 2014

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