On 11 November 2018, communities will gather on beaches across the UK to say goodbye. Film maker Danny Boyle invites you to mark 100 years since the Armistice and the end of the First World War, part of the 14-18-NOW WW1 Centenary Art Commissions.
See the event timetable here.
12:00 pm – 4:00 pm
Swansea Bay Beach & other locations.
Dorothy Watson, who lost her life in the First World War, will be commemorated by a large-scale sand portrait for Danny Boyle’s Armistice commission Pages of the Sea it was announced today. On Sunday 11 November, the public is invited to assemble at one of thirty-two beaches around the UK and the Republic of Ireland at low-tide for an informal, nationwide gesture of remembrance for the men and women who left their home shores during the First World War.
A large-scale portrait of Dorothy Watson, designed by sand artists Sand In Your Eye, will be drawn into the sand on the beach and washed away as the tide comes in. In addition, the public will be asked to join in by creating silhouettes of people in the sand, remembering the millions of lives lost or changed forever by the conflict. Each of the beaches taking part in the project will commemorate a different WW1 casualty.
Dorothy Watson was a 19-year-old Munitions Worker (known as Munitionettes) who was killed in an explosion at NEF (National Explosives Factory) in Pembrey in July 1917. Three others died in the same explosion and the joint funeral of Dorothy and Mildred Owen (18) brought Swansea High St to a standstill. The procession was headed by fellow Munitionettes in their uniforms.
Dorothy’s portrait will be created in the sand and in textiles on the 11th November. ‘A Stitch in Time’ will guide participants to follow pre-drawn lines on 30 cotton handkerchiefs which assembled will reveal Dorothy’s image. Cross stitch ‘kisses’, the initials of people to whom participants may wish to say goodbye and words from Carol Ann Duffy’s poem will be added.
