Part 1 Prehistoric Art

Here are a few questions To keep in mind…

 Why is art history important?  What can we learn from art history?  How does European or Western Art differ from non-western art?  Why would we want to know about other cultures other than our own?

1.Art for “intervention” : 2.Art for “affiliation” : 3.Art for “documentation”: 4.Art for “aesthetic contemplation”: to help transition to another world claims to the right to rule, right to family preserved a people’s history art that is personally enjoyable and environmentally enhancing

 Australian rock art  30,000 BCE North America Vero Beach Mammoth Bone  13,000 BCE

 Usually skill was handed down and kept in families  It was a privilege and highly regarded in the community to be an artist  Art was not democratic or casual

 Non-Western Art was functional  The opportunity to experience art was a privilege  Rarely was the experience informal  Viewing art was highly regulated by  Age  Gender  Social class  Level of initiation  Art had sound and motion  Was disposable

MAP OF THE WORLD MAP OF THE SAHARA DESERT

 1.5 to 2 million years ago  Pliocene Period or the Lower Paleolithic  Stone tools

,000 BCE Africa Began to migrate to Europe and Asia Began to create Cave paintings, rock art

CAVE PAINTINGS LASCAUX CAVE, MONTIGNAC, FRANCE HALL OF THE BULLS, C. 17,000 BCE UPPER PALEOLITHIC EARLY MAGDALENIAN PERIOD CARVED FERTILITY STATUES VENUS OF WILLENDORF C. 32,000 BCE LOWER PALEOLITHIC AURIGNACIAN PERIOD

 They did NOT live in the caves  Only occupied caves to decorate the walls  Ceremonial reasons  Sought shelter in a cave only in the worst weather conditions  Lived in cave mouths, sunny rock shelters, and huts or tents in the open air (Bahn p.10).  Cold  Were hunters and gatherers, with some farming  Wood workers  People of the Upper Paleolithic were fit and healthy  Lived in peace with other societies

What did the artists of the Paleolithic invent? Perspective Bestiary : a collection of fables, intended to teach a moral lesson, in which the characters are real or imaginary animals. Grease Lamp Scaffolds Pointillism : dots to create image Chiaroscuro : use of light and dark Friezes : A broad horizontal band of sculpted or painted decoration, esp. on a wall near the ceiling. Bas Relief : sculpture in low relief, in which the forms project slightly from the background but no part is completely detached from it Negative Space Powdered Colors Brushes Stumping Cloth The Very Concept of an Image (Picasso) Lascaux, France. (Up) Pleiades and Taurus, (down) Suggested Lunar Count (3).

Father Henri Breuil Dubbed the “Pope of Pre-History” Entire career in the caves “hunting magic” theory to explain caved art Create/use the animal images to “control” the beasts

Reds: iron ore, red ochre Blacks: charcoal or manganese Yellows: iron oxide Whites: chalk, burned bone or shell Clay ochre too provided some basic colors At Lascaux, hundreds of rudimentary pigment crayons were discovered scattered around the floor. Analysis of some of these has revealed that artists used recipes to prepare them, combining the raw color with talc or feldspar to increase their bulk, and adding animal and plant oils to bind the materials.

 September 1940, when four local boys stumbled on it while looking for a dog. The site was first studied by the French archaeologist Henri Breuil, who developed a system of dating art based on style

EXAMPLE OF BREUIL’S ARCHAIC STYLE AUROCHS (TYPE OF A BULL) 17 FEET TALL

HORSE WITH NEGATIVE HANDS PALEOHORSE

 The cave was first explored on December 18, 1994 by a group of three cave specialists, or speleologists  Eliette Brunel- Deschamps, Christian Hillaire and Jean-Marie Chauvet  They also discovered fossilized remains and markings from a variety of animals, some now extinct (the Cave Bear especially)

THE CAVE BEAR THOUSANDS OF BEAR SKILLS FOUND DIED OF NATURAL CAUSES, NOT KILLED ALTER OF THE CAVE BEAR?

MULTIPLE VIEWS LIGHT AND SHADOW (CHIAROSCURO) BAS RELIEF LINE QUALITY OVERLAP: MOVEMENT? MANY ANIMALS?

Multiple Artists Recent discovery says that actually there were multiple artists working over hundreds and even thousands of years on this section of the cave.