Ypres Peace Monument
Date: 2016
Designer: Sandra Dunn
Location: Langemark-Kolpakëlle, Belgium
Materials: Forged steel, bronze
Scope of Project: Design, forging, assembly
The Context
Sandra was one of twelve blacksmiths to be invited to design and build a railing panel for a WW1 Cenotaph that was installed in Langemark-Polkapelle, Belgium in 2016. The event brought together 180 blacksmiths from 30 different countries for a period of a week. The base of the cenotaph was surrounded by a circle of 2016 poppies that were forged by children and blacksmiths around the world. At an international forging event held in the Ypres market square in September, 2016 Sandra lead a team of six blacksmiths to forge and assemble the railing panel she designed.
The Design
The piece is about the soldiers buried in the mud; it's about Canadian soldiers imagining home - wheat fields, gardens, crops and landscape stretching out in the distance. It's the trenches and barbed wire and sandbags and it's those who died emerging from the ground in plant form - seeds for a future hope. The flower tops on these stalks were composed of approximately 75 bronze discs that represent the identification tags worn by Canadian Soldiers.
