Joël Brunet's Image

The cornflower and the poppy are familiar European symbols of remembrance for war veterans but nowadays they are scarcely seen in the wild. Joël was moved by this ‘rare beauty’ and climbed onto his car roof to get a wider view. He framed the scarlet flecks of the poppies to guide the onlooker’s gaze through the spectacle.

Poppies and cornflowers thrive on disturbed ground, growing and dying within a year. In agricultural fields they compete with commercially grown crops and are often killed by pesticides. These wildflowers are now among the world’s most threatened plants and tend only to be seen where they have been deliberately reintroduced.