Natalie Kalmus | |
|---|---|
 Kalmus in 1930 | |
| Born | Natalie Mabelle Dunfee April 7, 1878 |
| Died | November 15, 1965 (aged 87) |
| Occupation(s) | Color Art Director, Technicolor Corporation |
| Spouse | |
Natalie M. Kalmus (née Dunfee, also documented as Dunphy; April 7, 1878 – November 15, 1965) was the executive head of the Technicolor art department and credited as the director or "color consultant" of all Technicolor films produced from 1934 to 1949.[2]
Once an art student and model, she married American scientist and engineer Herbert T. Kalmus in 1902 and later co-founded with him the Technicolor Motion Picture Corporation, serving for two decades as the company's chief on-site representative at studios that rented Technicolor's cameras for filming their color productions. Natalie Kalmus, who is often credited as a co-developer of the Technicolor process itself, was a member of the production team that shot the first Technicolor footage in 1917.[2] Kalmus held strong views about the balanced use of color in film composition and often clashed with directors, cinematographers, and studio set designers who in her view sought to overuse dramatic colors simply as random accents in scenes, too often, gratuitously or for theatrical effect.[3]
- ^ While some obituaries and published profiles of Natalie Kalmus erroneously cite her birth place as Norfolk, Virginia, official period records relating to her (1902 Massachusetts marriage certificate, a passport application, a series of ship passenger lists, and other documents) consistently give Houlton, Maine as her place of birth.
- ^ a b "Natalie Kalmus Papers", online biographical profile of Kalmus in collection description, Margaret Herrick Library, Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, Los Angeles, California. Retrieved January 18, 2021.
- ^ Vincente Minnelli. I Remember It Well. New York: Doubleday, 1974.