My current body of work stems from a German air force camouflage pattern from World War I. This type of "dazzle" pattern was used effectively to obscure the mass of a low-flying aircraft when seen from above, over the forested countryside throughout Europe.
As a painter, I am fascinated by the complexity of the sequence of polygons in the pattern, and find the original color group (orange, dark green, purple-pink, and black) a vibrant starting point from which to work. What keeps me bound to the pattern, however, is my introduction to it through a movie made in the '70s called The Blue Max.
The Blue Max is about a German peasant who joins the ranks of noblemen flying biplane fighters in World War I. I saw the movie as a boy and was awed by the melodrama of the outnumbered, tattered squadron going up day after day to meet the enemy. The simulated dog fights and aerobatics are beautifully filmed, and the art direction of the planes is dead-on authentic. Biplanes are like giant box kites. Built by stretching linen over wooden ribs and spars, the craftsmen who applied the camouflage treated these machines like ultra-complex painting supports. The dazzle pattern covered all skyward surfaces on the planes, giving them deadly purpose.
I remember thinking, as a child, how beautifully strange the pattern seemed. It had a mysterious authority like a monarch's wings or the black spot around a killer whale's eye. Something engineered by nature.
|
|
