'Oldest' prehistoric art unearthed
Derek Dubwise
The world's oldest example of abstract art, dating back more than
70,000 years, has been found in a cave in South Africa.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_1753000/1753326.stm
Art or doodle? Doodle or art? You decide...
This ought to keep 'em arguing for some time. Doncha just love
science?
Actually... I think that they are looking at it upside down, and that
changes everything.
Derek -
Dan Twilley, D.C.
the North American Indian......in my opinion they are the random
doodling of a dude going thru an epiphany of
art..........NOT..........doesn't anyone think about the mud floors
and creek beds and sandy easels that we will never see?.....these
ancient dudes and dudeets surely scratchedand discovered the concepts
of geometrically similar shapes before 70,999 years
ago!??......opposable thumb....plant juices, clay and mud........fat
and plant juices......color vision........that piece of flat rock with
the horizontal boxes that are cross hatched....that is simply a
surviving piece of random geometrically eye pleasing symmetry.....i
guess that does make it art!
Speleo_Caver
a cave on the way to the wife's parents house.
The cave actually has semi trucks driving through it!!
Well after a couple of days of settling in we went on an informal tour of
the cave.
The Museum Curator showed us some beautiful cave art that he claimed was
15-20 thousand years old.
I asked how can you tell how old it is (expecting some sort of scientific
analysis) I was a bit shocked when he said it was graded by the quality and
artistic content and given an associated date.
I told him that if I had drawn it they would have assumed it was
Neanderthal!!
He said the tribe always picked the most qualified to perform the cave art.
I think that dating art this way is VERY inaccurate!
Trapper
Jo Schaper
analysis of the pigment. For example, if cave art shows people throwing atlatls
it is older than if they are using bows-- the atlatl technology was largely
replaced by the bow, at least in the US.
Since the only way to "scientifically" date art by the pigment (or pigment
binder) means you have to detroy the art, (or at least a portion of it), other
non-destructive means are used where possible. If the general public were told
that art were being destroyed in order to date it, there would be a much larger
hue and cry.
Don't underestimate the ability of a trained art historian or archeologist
to make such judgements. They have as much training in their fields as a
scientist does. One of the odd things, is that some of the most
representational cave art is actually the oldest-- just as in the twentieth
century, abstract art "degenerated" from DaVinci/Michaelangelo realism due to
the invention of the camera, the amount of "realism" isn't correlated to age.
Science is only one way of looking at the world.
Jo
Speleo_Caver
Jo,
It seems like circular reasoning to me.
You guess at a date and everything that looks similar is the same date.
Has anyone tried to apply this theory honestly to today's art? With in a
500 year span of time?
It would be easy to see if the theory actually worked.
Comparing the styles seems rather subjective.
Every artist has a different style.......
Some hunters still use bows and arrows today.....
It may all work in theory, but, that's all it is, theory. Correct?
The white lab coat......
It's the only difference between common man and a scientist.
They still have all the faults and the same propensities as the rest of us.
I understand twenty-five years ago Scientist's said we were entering another
Ice Age........
I'm sure they had evidence to support the theory.......
I don't have anything against Scientist's I'm just from Missouri......
Show-Me!
Trapper
Jo Schaper
Speleo_Caver wrote:
> Jo,
>
> It seems like circular reasoning to me.
>
> You guess at a date and everything that looks similar is the same date.
>
> Has anyone tried to apply this theory honestly to today's art? With in a
> 500 year span of time?
Sure. I am not an artist, however, I do have a degree in writing-- in several
college literature classes we were taught the technique to date a writing sample
by usage of words, syntax, style and content (i.e., an essay about computer
hardware talking about transistors would be unlikely to predate the early 1960s,
since even the word "transistor" did not exist before the device was invented.)
A similar technique is applied to art, and is how people detect art forgeries.
With a lot of experience, a person can tell if a particular piece of art is by
a particular artist. When a panel of people agree, this is the answer. (This is
the same thing which happens on the hard science side to validate (not prove) a
prevailing theory.)If you know when the artist lived, you can date the piece of
art. Applied to prehistory, archeologists take note of and date any artifacts
left in the cave, and use them to guide them to an "oldest" possible date for
the art.
>
>
> It would be easy to see if the theory actually worked.
I suggest you look at cave painting books by Abbe Henri Breuil, who is the
father of "scientific" cave painting study. Abbe Breuil was French, and studied
the paintings in France and Spain.
> Comparing the styles seems rather subjective.
Life itself is rather subjective-- any analysis by humans, be they scientists,
artists, or auto mechanics is subjective in the long run. Experience is probably
a better criteria to go on than "subjectivity."
>
>
> Every artist has a different style.......
That can be proven--but only by analyzing the characteristics.
>
>
> Some hunters still use bows and arrows today.....
So?
>
>
> It may all work in theory, but, that's all it is, theory. Correct?
That's all anything is. There are no facts, only probabilities.
>
>
> The white lab coat......
>
> It's the only difference between common man and a scientist.
Not true. Scientists use one technique of thinking, only when doing science. The
rest of the time they are "common men" (and women).
>
>
> They still have all the faults and the same propensities as the rest of us.
So? I don't claim that science is infallible. It isn't.
>
>
> I understand twenty-five years ago Scientist's said we were entering another
> Ice Age........
>
> I'm sure they had evidence to support the theory.......
Numbers are numbers, but theory is interpretation. This is one of the things
about science--there is more to it than meets the eye, and it is no where as
"objective" as is taught in high school.
> I don't have anything against Scientist's I'm just from Missouri......
> Show-Me!
If you are interested in this sort of thing, I suggest you read Petroglyphs
and Pictographs of Missouri by Carol Diaz-Granados and James R. Duncan. Then you
can understand more of how these art historians, ethnohistorians and
archeologists work and think. Also, I recommend Indians and Archeology of
Missouri by Dr. Carl and Eleanor Chapman, as well as the The Prehistory of
Missouri by Dr.Michael O'Brien and Dr.Raymond Wood. Diaz-Granados, Duncan,
O'Brien and Wood are still around and doing work.
Good caving,
Jo Schaper
Nigel Robertson
"Speleo_Caver" <rcwo...@socket.net> wrote in message
news:u4j0lpn...@corp.supernews.com...
>
> Jo,
>
> It seems like circular reasoning to me.
>
> You guess at a date and everything that looks similar is the same date.
They are not all 'guessed' at. You can even look at areas where there are
multiple superimposed paintings and decide that the ones at the bottom are
the oldest.
>
> Has anyone tried to apply this theory honestly to today's art? With in a
> 500 year span of time?
I don't see a problem with that working.
>
> It would be easy to see if the theory actually worked.
>
> Comparing the styles seems rather subjective.
>
> Every artist has a different style.......
So how do you get 'schools' of art? e.g. cubism.
Have you seen any cave art? If you have, I'm sure that you will be able to
determine similarities in style. You might not be able to tell which is the
oldest but you should be able to group styles from the same area.
>
> Some hunters still use bows and arrows today.....
>
> It may all work in theory, but, that's all it is, theory. Correct?
Theories are the bread and butter of science.
>
> The white lab coat......
>
> It's the only difference between common man and a scientist.
>
> They still have all the faults and the same propensities as the rest of
us.
>
> I understand twenty-five years ago Scientist's said we were entering
another
> Ice Age........
More than likely they said that we >could< be ... and also that it would
happen if various other things came to pass
>
> I'm sure they had evidence to support the theory.......
And then knew evidence comes to light. It's progress - otherwise our
knowledge base remains static.
>
> I don't have anything against Scientist's I'm just from Missouri......
Commiserations ;)
Nigel