December 28, 2006
French War Memorial
Seen recently on Flickr - again from Simon_K
The Commune of Ney is a rather scruffy suburb of Champagnole, but the parish church is beautiful. It has also benefited from some rather striking 1920s glass, including this extraordinary war memorial window. It depicts Mother France standing on a battlefield, and offering up her dead children to Christ. Each soldier is represented by a fruit which is being plucked from a tree, but the face of each of them is a real photograph. I had never seen anything like this before.
At first glance the circle portraits appear to be transferred from actual photographs by some mechanical means (decal, screenprint, etc.). But looking at the closer shots I think they are painted in the standard painting method of trace and matte, only in a very photorealistic style and almost certainly based on actual photographs. Still, it makes for an interesting stylistic mashup.
one closer shot
and an even closer look
Peace on Earth