Category: art

Camouflage

Camouflaged road in Finland during WW2. 1941.

The trees were hung up with ropes. This road sat 6 miles from the Russian border, so when looking down from observation airplanes, the road would be disguised.

It was intended to be viewed obliquely (slanted) not directly from above. The suspended trees would conceal enough of the road to make it difficult to identify visually when flying past, or from surveillance photos taken from aircraft. Camouflage is designed to break up the shape of something against the background, this would have been effective within certain limits.

Lost Time / Le Temps Perdu

Le Temps Perdu
Devant la porte de l’usine
le travailleur soudain s’arrête
le beau temps l’a tiré par la veste
et comme il se retourne
et regarde le soleil
tout rouge tout rond
souriant dans son ciel de plomb
il cligne de l’oeil
familièrement.
Dis donc camarade Soleil
tu ne trouves pas
que c’est plutôt con
de donner une journée pareille
à un patron?
Lost Time
Before the factory gate
the worker suddenly stops
the good weather has seized him by his coat
and as he turns back
and looks at the sun
all red all round
smiling in its leaden sky
it twinkles its eye
familiarly.
Say, my friend Sun
don’t you find
it’s rather silly
to give such a day
to a boss?