Artists Pay Tribute One Soldiers With 5,000 Poppies

Flowers are probably not the first thing that comes to mind when we think of war—which is perhaps why the art installation Weeping Window is so effective.

Containing nearly 5,000 ceramic red poppies, the crimson-colored installation is on display at the Woodhorn Museum in Northumberland, UK from September 12th through November 1st. Each handmade poppy is carefully arranged to appear as if it is plunging from the structure and pooling at the bottom, representing the fallen British and Commonwealth soldiers of World War One.

This is the Weeping Window installation in its original state at the Tower of London

Another peek at the Weeping Window at its original home

While it stands alone today, Weeping Window initially composed a single part of a much larger 2014 installation called Blood Swept Lands and Seas of Red, by artists Paul Cummins and Tom Piper.

To mark the centenary of World War I, the artists — who named their installation after the first line of a World War One era poem — crafted and “planted” 888,246 ceramic red poppies at the Tower of London — one for every British or Commonwealth soldier who died during the war.

The massive project took a team of 17,500 volunteers to pull off, but their efforts delivered: approximately five million people visited Blood Swept Lands and Seas of Red in 2014, making it one of the most popular and accessible artistic tributes to the Great War.

It did not come without its critics, though. Some art critics dismissed the installation as “impressive but curiously bland,” and a “prettified and toothless memorial.” But where some denounced the installation for being too commercial, installation co-creator Tom Piper saw that broad appeal as one of the installation’s strengths. “It is a remarkably good thing that it is so accessible. We should not be trying to create something that is difficult to understand,” Piper said.

It seems that Piper’s defense prevailed. Public reception was so positive that area politicians called for the exhibition to last a bit longer — much to the chagrin of the artists, who thought that the exhibit’s transience was a vital feature of the artistic concept.

Obviously, the designers did not get their way. Key components of Blood Swept Lands and Seas of Red are being exhibited throughout the United Kingdom to reach even more people. Waves (below) is currently on display at the Yorkshire Sculpture Park, and both Weeping Window and Waves will tour the UK until 2018, when they will find their permanent home at the Imperial War Museums.

The Waves installation in its original state at the Tower of London