The series of prints aims to repair nurses' memory stitch by stitch, using their own techniques: bandage and thread. The type was completely handmade and every letter was directly stitched on a white canvas made with bandage. Exclusive archive photos were restored for the campaign. 360 hours of manual work, 600 meters of thread, 250 meters of bandage using actual techniques of the Great War were necessary to create the campaign.

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The campaign intended to help a museum facing a loss of attendance and to bring to life the memory of an unprecedented war to protect a peace currently weakened by a Russian-Ukrainian conflict on the borders of Europe. But with this campaign, we also wanted to go further than with the previous ones by going beyond the celebration of a historical fact, the existence of war nurses, to address an ever more topical subject, the revelation of how they were forgotten. An approach which is more broadly part of the revaluation of the role of women in History, an issue which concerns us all and particularly younger generations. This rehabilitation seemed all the more necessary a few years afer COVID, now that the sound of our applause on the balconies seems distant. French nursing staff still suffer from a cruel lack of recognition. This is evidenced by the numerous white marches held in 2023 to denounce the crisis at the hospital, the lack of staff and low salaries.

The narrative of WWI, both in history courses and popular culture, mainly focuses on those on the frontlines, in the trenches: the soldiers. Overshadowing another army which also fought for its country, not by killing but by healing: Nurses. Beyond the tribute to heroines of the past, we had to bring these women out of oblivion and denounce a bigger societal issue, the invisibility of women in History. In her book “The Great Forgotten: Why History Has Erased Women”, Titiou Lecoq shows how, over time, women and their actions have been neglected, made invisible until being deleted altogether from History. The series of prints aims to repair nurses' memory using their own techniques, bandaging and sewing. Exclusive archive photos and striking words revealed their heroic role. Each print led to the untold story of a nurse in audio/video through a QR code.

The campaign aimed to make nurses of WW1’s stories heard by a wide audience, including younger generations.The challenge was to find an anchor point to make this subject resonate with the times. It was no longer just a question of paying homage to heroines of the past, we had to bring these women out of the oblivion into which they had fallen and denounce a very current reality, a societal issue greater than our nurses themselves, that of the invisibility of women in History. The campaign aims to restore nurses’ memory stitch by stitch, using their own techniques.

The type was completely handmade and every letter was directly stitched on a white canvas made with bandage. Exclusive archive photos were restored for the campaign. 360 hours of manual work, 600 meters of thread, 250 meters of bandage using actual techniques of the Great War were necessary to create the campaign. Creating a type was a way to give more meaning and strength to the words of the campaign and make nurses remembered. A tribute to WWI nurses’ work but also a visual way to rebuild a narrative that faded away with time. The red thread refers to the Red Cross and to the unprecedently violent nature of mechanized war as well. The type is called “Séraphine” as a tribute to Séraphine Pommier, one of the very few nurses who wrote a complete diary during the war. Underlining the value of words to keep memory alive for future generations.

The exhibition attracted 41,600 visitors, the greatest attendance since the museum’s opening in 2011.