[Disbound Photo Album]: Archive of a Camoufleur

MILFORD, Ellison J.

Publication Date: 1940

About this Item

Disbound photo album pages containing 143 photographs, most mounted onto black paper- a few with captions - along with 15 other items of ephemera, including announcements for exhibitions, news articles, three items of correspondence and restricted army orders. Very good with chips and tears. This collection consists of four folders, the bulk of which are taken up with photographs tipped onto blank album paper, along with assorted ephemera from Ellison s career, including orders. Approximately half the photographs pertain to the camouflage work, including photographs of camouflage in the field and the designing and manufacturing of camouflage, aerial views, and photographs of restricted camouflage test areas. The nature of camouflage is to elude recognition, making photography of them a paradoxical act. The photographs derive an odd and lasting power from the degree to which they deceive the viewer or not, or in the manner in which the facade of invisibility is constructed. The most confusing of the photographs are of a camouflage testing area, in which no camouflage seems apparent, even on close gaze, and the power resides in knowing the context - that there is a camouflaged object within view. To confuse the gaze further, some of the photographs are obviously model constructions, perhaps test dioramas which are eerily similar to doll houses. In a 1980 interview by Paul and Rita Kress which is hosted on the San Diego State University website, Ellison detailed his career as an artist. Ellison was born in Sioux City, Iowa, in 1909. He studied at the Chicago Academy of Fine Arts and the Chouinard Art School, and afterwards moved to California where he taught and exhibited in the seceding decades. During WWII Ellison saw an ad for a meeting about becoming a Camofleur in Los Angeles. In 1944 Ellison went over to England to do camouflage work in the field, including camouflaging eight fields in southern England prior to D Day. Subsequently Ellison was sent back to London where he was an instructor in the mines and booby traps school. After four weeks Ellison was sent to France and Belgium, where he worked to camouflage fields and worked on paintings in his spare time, which culminated in a 1945 exhibition at the La Jolla Fine Arts Gallery and the La Jolla Museum of Art. An interesting chapter of the longer story of fine artists working in the field of Camouflage beginning with WWI - a distinguished lineage which included the surrealist Roland Penrose and numerous Australian artists. Seller Inventory # 423054

Bibliographic Details

Title: [Disbound Photo Album]: Archive of a ...

Publication Date: 1940

Binding: Unbound

Condition: Very Good