WWI proof / children know the meaning of camouflage

Above and below These are two uncredited photographs that appeared in American publications during World War I (c1918). The top one shows the camouflage-patterned wings of a National Service airplane. The patterning works as well as it does in part because it is a grayscale photograph, so the dark disruptive shapes on the wings and tail blend in all too easily with the shadows and other irregular shapes on the ground. In addition, the symmetrical target-like circles contradict whatever confusion is caused by surface disruption.

The photograph at the bottom is even more suspect, if for different reasons. It claims to show three children holding up a toy model airplane on which they have painted a comparable disruptive scheme. The caption for the photograph reads—

Even youngsters soon learn war terms. These three, for instance, are proud to display their toy aeroplane [airplane], the mottled finish of which shows that they know the meaning of “camouflage.”

Today, in an era in which digital photo retouching is epidemic, we may not be surprised to find that this pre-computer image appears to have been retouched by hand. The contours of the chidren’s figures, as well as the shape of the airplane, have undoubtedly been strengthened, and the facial features of the figure in the center look suspiciously like an adult. 

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camouflage / a dance of beatings the boy endured

Above Roy R. Behrens, Papa's Waltz (© 2021). Digital montage.

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Yesterday, I put up this blog post and montage (above) on The Poetry of Sight, my more generic blog about vision, design, and the creative process. But it occurs to me that it might also be appropriate to repost it here, since Theodore Roethke's language has everything to do with camouflage, with concealed and embedded components.

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The title of the montage reproduced above (I sometimes call them “visual poems”) is intended as an homage to what some people regard as Theodore Roethke’s finest work, a sixteen-line autobiographical poem, titled “My Papa’s Waltz” (c1942). It is beautifully constructed, filled with engagement and gesture—and is yet at the same time disturbing in its beneath-the-surface suggestions.

Roethke, as a poet should, makes apt use of figures of speech, and we (the readers) are left to decide what to make of it. Does “papa’s waltz” simply describe an innocent dance, in which an inebriated father is engaged in ritualistic fun with his son, a small boy. Or, as certain components suggest, is it not a literal waltz, but instead a frightening memory of dance-like beatings the boy endured at the hands of a drunken parent?

You must read the entire poem, which is available online at the website of the Poetry Foundation. At the same, it also helps to read the article about this poem on Wikipedia, and to learn about the life of Theodore Roethke.