Wednesday, April 21, 2010

Lost Heroes Art Quilt

I attended a very moving ceremony yesterday at the Statehouse for the Lost Heroes Art Quilt. The quilt depicts 50 soldiers killed in the line of duty in Afghanistan and Iraq, one from each state. There are 32 other fallen soldiers in the top and bottom borders of the quilt.


What sets this apart from other commemorative wartime works of art is that each of the soldiers is portrayed as a youth, the faces of children wearing adult-sized field jackets. The artist, Julie Feingold, explains her reason for the depictions as children: “I was struck by a statement that one of the mothers made when she was interviewed after her son’s death. She stated that her son always wanted to be a soldier and often played in ‘G.I. Joe’ costume.”

In a moving speech, Kae McGuire, mother of Daniel McGuire, a Marine from Mashpee killed in action in Iraq on August 14, 2008, brought tears to many in the crowd, a number of whom had lost family members in the wars and who were holding red roses.

To learn more about the Lost Heroes Art Quilt, click here.

Copyright 2010 Randy Hunt
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1 comment:

  1. It was a moving moment to see the guilt, but more moving of the symbolism of these soldiers who had passed and their youthful faces in military jackets. Frank

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