Day #34 - Art for Lent: Paul Cummins and Tom Piper's "Blood Swept Lands and Seas of Red" #Lent2016

ART + RELIGION
By Aaron Rosen

"Blood Swept Lands and Seas of Red" (2014) by Paul Cummins and Tom Piper | UK. Ceramic poppies (Installation view, Tower of London, 2014)

Cummins, a ceramics artist, created the poppies for the memorial, while Piper, a theatre designer, choreographer their planting. The installation consists of 888,246 flowers, representing the number of British servicemen who died during the War, including the anonymous poet who penned the phrase 'Blood Swept Lands and Seas of Red' in the trenches. While gathering to plan poppies, participants retraced the last days in Britain for many soldiers in the Pals' battalions, who met up at the Tower before deployment. [page 187]

Lent is the annual Christian preparation for Easter. "Today's Art for Lent2016" features artworks that illustrate the Christian "Battle between Carnival and Lent."