Analyzing the Paintings Within the Lascaux Caves
1.
I think the cave artists were trying to say something about hunting. The cave is
mostly full of big game herbivores and the ninth chamber of the cave has a scene
that is very indicative of a bison hunt.
The abundance of animal paintings
relative to human ones could have been due to spiritual purposes. Apart from a
single human and bird, all the animals depicted are ones that the painter’s
group would have wanted to hunt, specifically ones that could potentially harm
people. There is a high concentration of large herbivores with few carnivores.
This could reflect how the painter’s group could have hunted herbivores often
and occasionally had to deal with predatory animals like big cats and bears. The
ninth chamber shows the dangerous nature of the animals painted, a picture of a
bison with what appears to be a spear embedded in it, its head is down and
facing a man leaning back. This could potentially be a depiction of a real event
where an impaled bison charged at a human. Due to the focus on big game the paintings indicate that the residents of the cave were most likely hunter gatherers.
There appears to have been challenges with painting in the cave. The most
apparent are due to the surface of the cave, and the skill of the artist. The
cave surface has varying levels of coarseness. The finer a rock surface, the
easier a brush could be used to depict solid outlines, as seen in the Chinese
horse paintings. When a brush was less useful, such as for filling in large
spaces with color or to paint on coarse surfaces, a spray painting technique was
often seen. To give sharp outlines with the spray method stencils were used to
limit where the paint was sprayed, as seen in the black stag. The cave surface
could sometimes cause awkward perspectives due to the curvature of the cave, to
compensate the painters had used an anamorphic technique, altering the
proportions of the painting to look better from the viewers’ perspective. There
is a trend in the cave that the most skilled paintings tend to be on the easiest
to see surfaces. It could be that in order to progress as artists the painters
practiced or sketched on parts of the cave that were out of the way, saving the
best surfaces for the most skilled work.
As previously stated, the art could have been for spiritual purposes, for the
sake of ensuring safety and success during a hunt for food or to defend against
a carnivore. It might also have been to encourage prosperity, by painting a
large volume of game the painter may have hoped to bring about an abundance of
food. It might also have been for historical purposes, the group could have been
depicting the world around them and the animals they hunted for story telling
and recollection.
 |
| Panel of the Wounded Man (Lascaux) |
 |
| A Chinese Horse (Lascaux) |
 |
| The Black Stag (Lascaux) |
2.
The depiction of the man, bird, rhino, and bison in chamber
nine could have been a memorial. The painting could be depicting a death, with
the bird, the only one in the entire cave, having some spiritual significance to
the painter. This could be comparable to aspects of modern art. There are often
paintings, songs, and other forms of art done in memorial for the deceased. This
was especially common in the relatively recent past, as seen in the tombs of
Chinese and Egyptian monarchs. Due to the secular nature of many current
societies it might not serve the same spiritual functions but the emotional
nature of the work may be comparable.
3.
I was interested in exploring sculpture,
specifically artists who specialized in animal sculptures.
 |
| Bobcat Monument by Rosetta |
https://www.palomar.edu/anthro/homo2/mod_homo_5.htm
https://archeologie.culture.gouv.fr/lascaux/en
Section 1:
ReplyDeleteRe: Message... That is probably correct in general. Can you be more specific? Perhaps we need to figure out *who* was the target of their message? Themselves? Future generations of this population? Other human groups? It is easier to figure out what they are saying when you figure out who they are talking to.
Re: Animals... I agree with nearly all your suggestions here as they reflect a concrete function that would perhaps provide some benefit to these people. But I'm curious as to why you through "spiritual purposes" into the first sentence when you never explored this further? More on that below.
Re: Aspects of culture... I suspect you combined the response to this prompt with the last one, so I'm having a little trouble parsing out your answers. Given the time range for this population (15,000) years ago, we already know they were likely hunter-gatherers. Domestication of animals (for pastoralism) and domestication of plants (for horticulture and agriculture) hadn't occurred yet. What else might we learn about this culture from these pictures? It tells us that they were innovative in their development of pigments and controlling fire to light their way in the caves. They would have had to be fairly skilled spelunkers to navigate those caves safely, without getting lost. It also tells that they were hunters and hunted cooperatively, in addition to the kind of animals they hunted. It tells us they had what we would consider "leisure time" to allow for this process of creating paints, tools and the images themselves. And often we can learn based upon what is *missing*, not just what is there. There are no berries, no mushrooms, no birds, no fish and no eggs, things that would be part of the "gathering" process. So who is painting this pictures, men or women? Does that tell us anything about the gender roles of this culture?
Re: Difficulties... I agree with your suggestions, but what about location itself? The caves were deep and very dark. Accessing them safely with all of the tools and pigments would have been challenging, and they would have needed a way to light the caves to work.
Re: Functions... Let's step back a second and consider this from the perspective of early humans. Survival was their primary goal... finding food, maintaining shelter, protecting their family/community from threats, and competing for resources against other organisms. This practice of painting animals on the wall was difficult and dangerous. It wasn't a casual activity. It required time, planning, supplies, and no small amount of daring to access those deep dark caves. There must have been a very *real* benefit to balance the costs of this activity.
So story telling and recording history for future populations would make sense, particularly for a migrating population. I'd have to consider "encouraging prosperity" as I need evidence to support this.
With regard to the suggestion of "religion": Do we really need to opt for a religious function here? What evidence do we have for that? I know that the original researchers claimed a religious function, but later researchers opposed that jump in logic, which said more about the biases of the researchers than the intent of the paintings.
Are you familiar with the concept of Occam's Razor? It suggests that if simpler explanations work in understanding the function of a behavior or an event, then there is no need to opt for more complex driving forces. This applies here. Do we need to resort to religion and faith and a supreme being to explain the function of these paintings? Or can they be explained by "simpler" concepts, such as gaining resources, survival, and teaching future generations about these herds? This doesn't rule out a religious explanation, but recognizes this just raises more questions... such as where is the evidence that it IS religious in nature. We can't just assume that.
Some possible functions:
a. Story-telling
b. Teaching young hunters
c. Record-keeping
d. Recording events
Google limited my comment length, so I will finish it here:
Delete___________________________________________________________
Section 2: Let's consider some functions beyond the spiritual nature. Art can communicate information and ideas or record events for future populations. It can generate anger or support or passion. It can inspire others to act or bolster a person's courage. It can teach and inform and make people aware of important issues or concerns. One great example of this is photography, which is used to communicate and inform people of events, positive or negative, and can be used to inspire people to act or warn of impending horrific events. Think a bit more deeply on this. How many of these functions can also be applied to these cave paintings?
Section 3: In general, good discussion in your last section, though I would have liked you to expand upon this interesting art form. Any possible detriments that you can think of?