English: Another visit to Handsworth Park, to see the Handsworth Park Arts Trail.

The Sons of Rest Mosaic was made in 2018.

Located to the left of the Handsworth Park Community Garden.

Claire Cotterill was commissioned to produce the Sons of Rest Mosaic in honour of the WW1 Centenary. In response to the commission, she based the mosaic on the stained-glass window in the Sons of Rest building in Handsworth Park. The original window leant itself to representing the roots of the movement being in the First World War, leading to the formation of the Sons of Rest, represented in the treetop. Through archival research, Claire gathered relevant imagery from WW1 and the Sons of Rest Movement, weaving them throughout the tree. There are many images to explore when you look closely! Claire is a Birmingham based, multi-media artist, with a specialism in mosaic. One of the things she loves about mosaic is its accessibility to all and the teamwork needed to produce at a large-scale, creating a permanent artwork truly representative of a community. Her fascination with people and places has led to an emphasis on ‘visual storytelling’ using archival research and new technologies alongside traditional handmade methods within her work.

Claire explored new processes through the commission, creating digital files for water jet cutting porcelain tiles, to fit the various shapes within the tree. She then had the many sections fired with archival photographs as part of the process. The rest of the mosaic was constructed using traditional methods.

During the launch of the piece Claire ran a workshop with year six pupils from St Mary’s C of E Primary School, which the pupils found fascinating.