JOAN LEWIS
The Empty Chair
Watercolour
69 x 82cm
The Empty Chair is my tribute to Great Uncle Cyril. He was 18 years and 9 months old when he enlisted, along with his brother Leo. The year was 1916.
Cyril died at the battle of Bullecourt on 3rd of May 1917, aged 20. Leo received injuries, came home and was never quite whole again.
The empty chair symbolises the vacant space left in the family and the sorrow of the parents left to grow old without him, forever carrying the knowledge that they signed the enlistment papers.
I see his mother, setting the meal table, in a moment of forgetfulness, laying his place.
He lies in the HAC British Cemetery Ecoust St. Mein, France.
RIP Private 6113 Cyril Thomas Lewis.
