Prehistoric Cave Art

Prehistoric Cave Art Collections:

A little Spanish girl, exploring her father’s estate in 1879, found an opening in the ground into which she decided to crawl. She discovered some of the oldest art ever created, the prehistoric cave paintings near Alta Mira, Spain. Authorities initially dismissed the paintings as hoaxes, since they evidenced a degree of intricacy and proficiency not believed possible. However, after the discovery of more caves in northern Spain and southern France, such as the cave at Lascaux, art historians reexamined the caves at Alta Mira and accepted them as genuine. Scientists, having studied footprints, bones, and charcoal from the caves at Alta Mira and Lascaux, date the cave paintings between 20,000 and 10,000 BCE, or the Upper Paleolithic era.

The cave paintings at Alta Mira, of Paleolithic bison, utilize the natural contours of the cave wall, painted over raised, rounded portions on the surface of the wall. Originally, historians believed that the bison, shown lying and rolling on the ground, were dead and dying, that the prehistoric painters were commemorating a hunt. Later interpretations assert that the bison are shown wallowing on the ground, a habit of modern day bison during mating season. Therefore, the Paleolithic painters were recording aspects of nature, not martial accomplishments.

At Lascaux, the cave paintings are also incorporated with the natural features of the cave wall. Prehistoric artists painted on the smooth limestone vein forming the cave ceiling, using the line where the limestone meets the jagged rock wall as a ground line for the scenes. The animals portrayed at Lascaux are linear compositions, shown in profile, drawn and painted in rows along a common ground line. The animal paintings at Lascaux are organized by species in different sections and rooms of the cave. The most famous, the Great Hall of Bulls, features several layers of composition from different time periods, later compositions painted and drawn directly on top of earlier ones. One particularly intriguing series is the Swimming Stags, cave paintings of prehistoric deer crossing a river, only their heads and antlers visible.

The reason that prehistoric humans created such extensive and detailed cave paintings remains a mystery and the cause for much speculation in historical and sociological circles. Initially, art historians initially clung to the “art for art’s sake” argument, claiming that prehistoric humans inherently needed to decorate their surroundings, to make their world a more beautiful place. After investigation of the caves, historians discovered that the caves were not dwelling places, but communal gathering places, sites for religious ceremonies. Authorities now hypothesize that the cave paintings were part of religious or social events and the act of painting was more important than the finished product. Regardless of the intentions of the Paleolithic cave artists at Lascaux and Alta Mira, the works exists as a window into a past otherwise obscured by the ether of time. Contemporary historians have access to the natural world, ritualistic traditions, and artistic techniques of humans distant to us by 20,000 years. The paintings are like Paleolithic photographs of animals undisturbed by human civilization and technology, long before they were hunted into extinction.



James Webb©2005