The sculpture symbolises the Total War of WW1 in which the entire population was mobilised, the mother and child represent home, the Trench Art is very evocative of the period and life in the trenches, whilst the shell case reflects the contribution made by the women in the factories “at home”.
What we see here is the “transition” of women in many ways from “too delicate” to do “a man’s” job to being a fully able welder etc. and the transition between the role of life-give to death giver. There were adverts at that time that “morphed” the manufacture of destructive weaponry “into a maternal endeavour to suit contemporary ideas of femininity with munitions workers birthing happy families of smiling shells” (Ref Great War Fashions by Lucy Addlington).
