A camoufleur or camouflage officer is a person who designed and implemented military camouflage in one of the world wars of the twentieth century. The term originally meant a person serving in a First World War French military camouflage unit. In the Second World War, the British camouflage officers of the Middle East Command Camouflage Directorate, led by Geoffrey Barkas in the Western Desert, called themselves camoufleurs, and edited a humorous newsletter called The Fortnightly Fluer. Such men were often professional artists. The term is used by extension for all First and Second World War camouflage specialists. Some of these pioneered camouflage techniques. This list is restricted to such notable pioneers of military camouflage.
Surrealist artist Roland Penrose wrote that he and Julian Trevelyan were both "wondering how either of us could be of any use in an occupation so completely foreign to us both as fighting a war, we decided that perhaps our knowledge of painting should find some application in camouflage." Trevelyan later admitted that their early efforts were amateurish. Working in camouflage was not a guarantee of a safe passage through the war. Lucien-Victor Guirand de Scévola's Section de Camouflage, founded in September 1914 in the French army, developed many new techniques, some of them highly dangerous, such as putting up artificial, camouflaged trees at night to replace actual trees with cramped observation posts. The Cubist painter André Mare was wounded while preparing one such observation tree. Fifteen of his camoufleur colleagues were killed during the First World War.
Some camoufleurs such as Solomon J. Solomon, aged 54 at the start of the First World War, believed that artistic skill was necessary for the design or construction of effective camouflage. He wrote that "the camoufleur is, of course, an artist, preferably one who paints or sculpts imaginative subjects. . . He must leave no clues for the detective on the other side in what he designs or executes, and he must above all things be resourceful. But his imagination and inventiveness should have free play".
Not all the camoufleurs were artists. John Graham Kerr and Hugh Cott were zoologists, though Cott was also a skilled illustrator. Both men believed passionately that effective disruptive camouflage was vital, especially in the face of aerial observation, but they had difficulty persuading authorities such as the British Air Ministry that their approach was the right one. At least one Royal Air Force officer felt that Cott's camouflage was highly effective, but, since it would demand the presence of a skilled artist for every installation, too costly to be practical.
| Dates | Nationality | Description | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1881–1966 | American | Painter of murals; organized artists for training as camouflage specialists, leading to the founding of the American Camouflage Corps in 1917.[1] | ||
| 1864–1948 | French | École de Nancy painter; invented modern military camouflage in 1914, which was initially rejected by the French Army.[2] | ||
| 1871–1950 | French | Symbolist pastel painter; leader of French Camouflage Department in First World War | ||
| 1852–1931 | French | Impressionist painter, member of de Scévola's team[3] | ||
| 1869–1957 | Scottish | Embryologist, advocate of ship dazzle camouflage in First World War, influence on Hugh Cott (Second World War camoufleur) | ||
| 1879–1940 | German-Swiss | Painter using expressionism, cubism and surrealism. Camouflaged aircraft during the war.[4] | ||
| 1884–1954 | American | Leader of scientific research section of U.S. Navy camouflage unit in First World War[5] [6] | ||
| 1880–1916 | German | Expressionist painter, printmaker; pioneered pointillist canvas tarpaulin camouflage | ||
| 1885–1932 | French | Cubist painter, camouflaging artillery guns and observation trees | ||
| 1891–1938 | American | Art teacher, served in France with the American Camouflage Corps[7] | ||
| 1860–1927 | British | Academic painter, pioneer of camouflage netting | ||
| 1849–1921 | American | Painter, discoverer of countershading | ||
| 1890–1975 | British | Avant-garde sculptor, colleague of Solomon, made 'tree' observation posts | ||
| 1889–1949 | British | vorticist painter, designer of dazzle camouflage for ships[8] | ||
| 1877–1963 | American | Impressionist painter, inventor of Warner System camouflage measure for ships[9] | ||
| 1878–1971 | British | Marine painter, pioneer of dazzle camouflage for the Royal Navy and the U.S. Navy |
| Dates | Description | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| 1909–1943 | British painter, camouflage in Western Desert: Operation Bertram died 1943.[10] | ||
| 1896–1979 | British film maker, Director of Camouflage, Middle East Command[11] | ||
| 1910–1999 | British architect, worked on camouflage for Air Ministry 1939–1944[12] | ||
| 1913–2008 | British painter, camouflage in Western Desert[13] | ||
| 1903–1973 | British sculptor, born in Cape Town; camouflage in Western Desert 1942 | ||
| 1900–1987 | British zoologist, author of textbook Adaptive Coloration in Animals, government Advisory Committee on Camouflage 1939–40, advisor to British Army during Battle of Britain, Chief Instructor at Camouflage Training and Development Centre, Middle East at Helwan, Egypt | ||
| 1913–2009 | British fauvist painter, camouflage officer for southeast England preparing for D-Day landings[14] | ||
| 1901–1988 | British surrealist painter, printmaker; with Roland Penrose set up camouflage training unit[15] | ||
| 1897–1973 | Russian general, responsible for maskirovka including army-scale camouflage and dummy units in the Battle of Kursk, achieving tactical surprise | ||
| 1902–1973 | British stage magician, camouflage in Western Desert 1942, exaggerating his role and effectiveness | ||
| 1904–1978 | English stage designer, pioneer of pillbox (concrete strongpoint) camouflage[16] | ||
| 1914-2005 | British social realism artist, camouflage officer at Civil Defence Camouflage Establishment (CDCE), Royal Leamington Spa, senior lecturer of figure drawing at the Ipswich Art School[17] | ||
| 1900–1984 | English surrealist artist; teacher of camouflage, author of Home Guard Manual of Camouflage | ||
| 1913–1989 | Scottish film art director, camouflage in Western Desert 1942 including Siege of Tobruk and dummy port at Ras el Hillal; invented "Net Gun Pit"; the second-in-command, to Barkas, in Middle East camouflage | ||
| 1909–1983 | British film art director and production designer, camouflage in Western Desert 1942 including dummy railhead at Misheifa, dummy port at Ras el Hillal and Operation Crusader | ||
| 1913–1979 | English painter, illustrator, Punch cartoonist; camouflage in Western Desert, Operation Bertram 1942 | ||
| 1882-? | German art professor, from 1935 director of the newly formed camouflage department (named "T" for "Tarnung", camouflage) where he designed a series of disruptive patterns for camouflage clothing including Platanenmuster (plane tree) and erbsenmuster (pea dot) for the Waffen-SS.[18] | ||
| 1909–1989 | British ornithologist, conservationist and painter of wildfowl, and naval officer exploring ship camouflage | ||
| 1910–1974 | English Post-Impressionist painter, camouflage advisor to Field Marshal Auchinleck;[19] invalided 1944 | ||
| 1904–1974 | English neo-romanticist painter and illustrator; camouflaged Royal Air Force aerodromes[20] | ||
| 1907–1976 | Scottish architect (Art Deco style 1933); officer in British Army's Camouflage Training and Development Centre (CDTC) at Farnham[21] | ||
| 1914–1999 | British stained glass designer, ceramist and painter; first Grade 2 Camouflage Staff Officer in British army; created dummy railhead at Misheifa, Egypt in 1941, dummy port at Ras al Hilal, Cyrenaica in 1942.[22] | ||
| 1880–1944 | British portrait painter; camouflaged roofs of Rolls-Royce aircraft engine factories in Derby as houses[23] | ||
| 1910–1988 | British printmaker and teacher; pioneer of desert camouflage and deception |
| Dates | Description | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| – | American designer of digital camouflage pattern MARPAT.[24] |