When the mayor of the northern French town of Givenchy-de-Gothelle first looked at the bright photos of the historic monument honouring the Battle of Vimy Ridge, he immediately knew they had to be included in this year’s centenary celebrations.

Within an hour of seeing the photos in February of last year, Mayor Pierre Senechal had asked Toronto’s Racheal McCaig to put together a photo exhibition for the commemoration of the 100th anniversary of the Battle of Vimy Ridge.

McCaig’s exhibition, called Je Me Souviens: Vimy 100, will be the only work on display by a Canadian artist at the town’s new library and museum, which opens April 1.

“What I was really trying to do is recreate what it feels like to stand there, be there, see all of this, but also to bring history to life and perhaps give us a glimpse into our own Canadian story,” McCaig said in an interview from her Toronto home.

Three years ago, when McCaig and her two children were wandering through the park at Vimy Ridge on a cool rainy day, she said she knew just the basic details about the historic battle.

She was aware thousands of Canadians died at that very spot in 1917. She knew the event is on the $20 bill, and on two pages of Canadian passports.

But it wasn’t until she approached the massive stone monument that she felt the weight of what happened almost 100 years earlier.

“It was such a surreal moment,” McCaig said. “Until you’re actually standing there, you don’t really understand the scope and size of what happened.”

About 3,600 Canadians were killed in the brutal battle that began on April 9, 1917 and ended four days later. About 7,000 were wounded in the fight that was a defining moment for Canada as a young nation.

“It was really the first time that Canadians were recognized on the world stage and treated as Canadians, rather than British subjects,” said Jeremy Diamond, the executive director of the Vimy Foundation.

Last year, the Vimy Foundation commissioned a poll sampling more than 1,000 Canadians about the historic event and discovered that 83 per cent agreed it should be one of the most important celebrations of this year.

About 30,000 people are expected at this year’s centenary celebration in northern France. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and French President Francois Hollande are expected as well.

As an arts and entertainment photographer, McCaig has taken photos of Daniel Radcliffe, Hilary Swank and John Malkovich, to name a few.

But since her visit to the Vimy site in 2014, McCaig has become an amateur historian, researching many of the names etched onto the tombstones in the northern French area.

McCaig learned about Percy Moore, a 16-year-old boy from Carleton Place, Ont. who she said lied about his age several times in order to enlist for the war. He died on April 9, 1917.

She also discovered Gordon Bennett Morgan, a 21-year-old movie manager from Toronto who was also killed on April 9, 1917.

Photos of tombstones belonging to young men such as Moore and Morgan will be included in McCaig’s exhibition.

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“Racheal’s work is particularly original, because it shows pictures from a different angle than we usually see,” said Benoit Scatkowski, president of the Givenchy 2017 Year of Canada committee in France. “That originality is what attracted us (to her work).”

After being on display at Givenchy-en-Gothelle and then Paris, the exhibition will come to Canada, beginning in Toronto on June 20.

“What this exhibit does is allows the Vimy centennial celebration to be extended over a whole year,” said Diamond. “It isn’t just one day, it’s not just one hour where dignitaries make speeches. It’s important for the whole year to be a year of awareness and celebration and commemoration.”

McCaig hopes that people who see her photos come away from it “with a sense of national pride.”

“I hope they really are recognizing that Canada is a great place, and has a rich and diverse and engaging history and culture,” she said.