The Birth of Art Paleolithic and Neolithic Artists

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The Birth of Art Paleolithic and Neolithic
Artists

• Prehistoric Painting, Sculpture and Architecture

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Prehistoric Europe and the Near East
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Goals

• Understand the origins of art in terms of time
  period, human development and human activity.
• Explore origins of creativity, representation,
  and stylistic innovation in the Paleolithic
  period.
• Describe the role of human and animal figures in
  Paleolithic art.
• Examine the materials and techniques of the
  earliest art making in the Paleolithic period.
• Illustrate differences between the Paleolithic
  and Neolithic art as a result of social and
  environmental changes.
• Understand and evaluate the types of art
  prevalent in the Neolithic period.

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The First Human Creation dealt with hunting and
being hunted, with birth, life, and death, with
existence, extinction, and the afterlife, some
of the same issues that we must confront today
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Stone Age is Divided intoThree Major Periods

• Paleolithic
• Greek, paleo old lithis stone
• Divided into three phases
• Lower, middle and upper
• Depending on location in the strata, upper is
  most recent
• Strata the layers of earth containing
  archeological artifacts
• Mesolithic
• Middle stone age
• Neolithic
• New Stone Age
• Began at the end of the Ice Age in Europe

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Paleolithic Era

• Paleolithic era refers the time period during
  which human beings were making tools of stone, 
  art begins at approximately 35,000 BCE a time at
  which human beings seem to have circled the
  globe.
• The time frame for Paleolithic art can be
  described from 35,000 BCE to approximately 12,000
  BCE when people lived in hunter-gatherer nomadic
  tribes and prior to the development of
  agriculture. 
• The time frame has been pushed back in recent
  years to reflect current discoveries that show
  earlier use of stone tools. 

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During the Upper Paleolithic period there were no
forms of writing

• People used the visual arts as a means of
  communication.
• The art work that survives provides us with
  insights into the lives and beliefs of our
  earliest ancestors.

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• In art, the Paleolithic era is marked by cave
  paintings and drawings of animals as well as
  small sculptures. 
• It is thought that the animals were either those
  needed for food and that the paintings were some
  type of ritual related to the hunt, or that the
  animals were sacred and were given god-like
  qualities. 
• It has also been suggested that the paintings
  represent primitive calendars or almanacs,
  "coming of age" ceremonies, records of tribal
  migrations, and mystic paintings during a
  shamanistic trance.

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Beginning of Architecture

• People have always sought shelter from the
  elements
• Caves, trees, simple huts
• Some Upper Paleolithic people constructed more
  complex dwellings
• Circular huts made of branches, bones and hides
• Some are as larges as 24x33 feet

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Remains of these early dwellings made from
mammoth bones have been found in Russia and
the Ukraine
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Larger Dwellings had Designated Areas for
Specific Tasks

• Cooking
• Eating
• Working stone
• Making cloth
• Sleeping

Some cave dwellers colored their floors with
powdered pigments. Why?
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Paleolithic Builders Created Settlements

• Some with as many as 10 houses clustered together
• What does this tell us?
• Mezhirich in the Ukraine is one of the best
  preserved mammoth hut villages
• Houses ranged from 13 to 26 feet in diameter
• Mammoth bone framework covered by animal hides
  and turf
• Inside largest dwelling archeologists found
• 15 small hearths that still contained ashes and
  charred bones left by the last occupants

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Mezhirich reconstruction Dwelling 1
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• Bone needle with an ornamental head, probably
  used to fasten garments, found at the Mezhirich
  in the Ukraine site.
• Photo K. Sklenar, 'Hunters of the Stone Age'

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Paleolithic Sculpture

• Earliest known works of sculpture were small
  figures of people and animals, dating to 32,000
  BCE
• Often made of bone, ivory, stone or clay
• 1000s have been found across Europe and Asia
• The 3D pieces are examples of sculpture
• in the round
• Relief sculptures were also produced
• A relief is a raised image carved into a flat
  surface

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Lion/Human

• Found broken in pieces in Germany
• Restoration? Good or bad?
• Reflects sophisticated thinking
• Why?
• Exhibits considerable technical skill

Hohlenstein-Stadel, Germany c. 30,000-26,000
BCE Mammoth ivory  
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Nude Women and Animals are most common subjects
from the Upper Paleolithic period
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Often referred to as the Venus of Willendorf,
(why?) it was carved 10,000 years before the cave
paintings of Lascaux. This simplified form,
which emphasizes breasts and buttocks, was
probably intended to depict fertility. This
statue was carved, which is a subtractive
technique using a sharp instrument to gouge. She
is carved in the round.
Woman of Willendorf
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Women fromBrassempouy

• Only 1 1/2
• Abstract forms
• Memory Image
• Relies on generic shapes that come to mind
• when the object is mentioned

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Why so many statues of women?

• Some historians speculate that prehistoric
  society must have been a matriarchal society
• Others believe that fertility and birth were
  concerns of many prehistoric societies
• It was very important for women to become
  pregnant and for the babies to survive
• But the bottom line is we really dont know why
  there were some many statues of women

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Horse carved from mammoth ivory, 2" longPolished
and worn by long usageVogelherd, Germany, ca.
31,000 BP
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Carved Bison Licking Insect Bitenote the incised
lines that create detail
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Late Neolithic Pig Sculpture
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Neolithic Plastered Skull7000BCE Jordan
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Paleolithic Cave Art
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Prehistoric Art in Europe entered a rich and
productive phase between28,000-10,000 BCE

• During this period there was lots of cave
  painting in Southern France and Northern Spain
• There are hundreds of cave paintings depicting
• individual animals and herds of animals
• Dramatic images of grazing, running and resting
• Occasionally there were images of both men and
  women
• Also some hand prints and geometric markings

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Chauvet Cave in Southern Franceis the oldest
cave discovered to date
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The Altimira Caves, Spainc. 12,000 BCE

• The Altamira Cave was the first cave discovery of
  prehistoric art. In 1879, a Spaniard Don
  Marcelino de Sautola was excavating a large cave
  with his daughter. She shouted that she had seen
  some bulls painted on the ceiling of thecave. In
  reality the bulls were bison. The discovery would
  take 22 years to be considered genuine.

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Contracted Bison, Altamira, Spain c. 12,000BCE
(Paleolithic), cave painting on limestone
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Altimira Spain
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Altimira Spain
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The Cave at Lascaux, France15,000-13,000 BCE

• The cave is not large it is only 90 feet from
  the entrance to the cat's hole. Passages that led
  to the caves were narrow and low. This famous
  cave was discovered in 1940 , 70 years after
  Altamira, by a group of boys and a dog and the
  rabbit they were chasing. The dog fell into a
  hole left by a recently uprooted tree. When one
  of the boys slithered down the hole to rescue the
  dog, he found himself in a gallery bright with
  color and animals on the walls.

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Plan of the Lascaux Cave
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Cave Painting Lascaux France15,000 to 10,000 BCE
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The Hall of Bulls, Panoramic view of a cave
wallLascaux, France, early period, 15,000-13,500
B.C.
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Lascaux
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Note the various sizes of animals that were
probably added at different times over a 1,000
years.Some animals are painted in twisted
perspective, in which the head and body is in
profile but the horns are shown in 3/4 view to
show both horns. and a variance of size. They
are painted in polychrome ("poly" many,
"chrome" color).
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• BIRD HEADED MAN WITH BISON AND RHINOCEROS
• Lascaux caves.
• c. 15, 000-13,000 BCE.
• Look at the fallen man. He has a bird face (
  mask?).
• Perhaps the man is in a trance. The man is
  drawn crudely, whereas greater attention is given
  to the other creatures.

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BisonLe Tuc d' Audoubert, France. 13,000 BCE.

• Excellent example of unbaked clay. Created by
  modeling, which unlike carving, is an additive
  process. The clay from the cave floor is pliable
  when wet and dries hard, but is still very
  fragile.

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Neolithic Period10,000-5,000 BCE

• Time period after the Ice Age

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• The Neolithic era is generally understood as that
  time period during which people began to settle
  into small agricultural communities and
  eventually formed cities. 
• Various artistic expressions developed as people
  required permanent dwellings (architecture)
• furniture and utensils (wood crafts and pottery)
• a fixed location for gods and goddesses (temple
  building and religious objects)
• secure places for the bodies of the deceased
  (tombs, ossuaries and urns).

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Neolithic Rock Shelter Art

• Different from those found in Upper Paleolithic
  caves
• Style is often abstract or geometric
• Technique is often simple line drawings
• New themes in the paintings
• People are scene in energetic poses
• Engaged in hunting, dancing and battles
• Both men and women are portrayed

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Neolithic Rock PaintingSpain, 4,000-2,000 BCE
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Detail rock shelter painting
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Neolithic Stone Structures

• Megaliths
• Menhirs
• Henges
• Stone Circles

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Social Changes in Neolithic Period

• As people adopted a more settled way of life,
  they began to build large structures
• Like dwellings, storage spaces, and animal
  shelters
• After the Ice Age, timber was in abundant supply
  for building
• People clustered their buildings in small
  villages
• They built large tombs and ritual centers outside
  of their settlemants

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Skara Brae, 3100-2600 BCEOrkney Islands Scotland
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Skara Brae

• Skara Brae was constructed of stone, which was
  plentiful in this austere region
• A long ago storm buried this seaside village
  under a thick layer of sand
• In 1850, another storm exposed the buried village
• This village presents a vivid picture of
  Neolithic Life
• Archeologists found beds, shelves, cooking pots,
  basins, and pottery

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Skara Brae consists of a compact cluster of
buildings linked together by covered walkways
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Stone House Skara BraeThe walls are made
entirely of stone with a type of construction
called corbeling
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Corbeling- each layer of stone projects slightly
inward over the one below.

• Eventually the walls would meet creating a corbel
  vault

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Post and Lintel Shelvesthe vertical elements are
posts and the horizontal one creating the bridge
is the lintel
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Ceremonial Tomb Architecture
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Menhir

• A megalithic
• (big stone)block placed in an upright position
• Some stones weighed several tons
• Some are arranged in circles, or rows
• How did they lift them?

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Menhir Alignment at Menec, Carnac, France, c.
4250-3750 BCE
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Stonehenge
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StonehengeNote the Post and Lintel Construction
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Ariel View of Stonehenge
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Neolithic CeramicsDenmark, c. 3000-2000 BCE

• Ceramics are made of baked clay
• Neolithic artists were technically skilled in the
  use of clay for both pottery and sculpture
• The creation of fired clay reflects a conceptual
  leap for the prehistoric artist
• Why?

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Bronze Age

• The Bronze Age overlaps the Neolithic era in time
  (c. 2300 BCE) and is generally marked by an
  increased use of metals to replace stone tools
  and an increase in human settlements, often with
  locations marked by large geoglyphs and
  megalithic structures like Stonehenge.

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Metal Work

• First in So. Europe, gold, copper and tin was
  mined, worked and traded
• Bronze and alloy of copper and tin is found later
  in graves and settlements of No. European
  farming communities

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Horse and Sun Chariot, bronze and goldDemark, c.
1800-1600 BCE
What does this object tell us about the artist
and the society in which it was created?
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Bronze Casting Lost Wax Technique

• A method of casting metal such as bronze, by a
  process in which a wax mold is covered with clay
  and plaster and then fired, melting the wax,
  leaving a hollow form.
• Molten metal is then poured into the hollow space
  and slowly cooled.
• When the hardened clay and plaster exterior shell
  is removed a solid metal form remains to be
  smoothed and polished.

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Bronze Age China

• The long period of the Bronze Age in China, which
  began around 2000 B.C., saw the growth and
  maturity of a civilization that would be
  sustained in its essential aspects for another
  2,000 years.
• In the early stages of this development, the
  process of urbanization went hand in hand with
  the establishment of a social order.
• In China, as in other societies, the mechanism
  that generated social cohesion, and at a later
  stage statecraft, was ritualization.
• As most of the paraphernalia for early rituals
  were made in bronze and as rituals carried such
  an important social function, it is perhaps
  possible to read into the forms and decorations
  of these objects some of the central concerns of
  the societies (at least the upper sectors of the
  societies) that produced them.
• From Timeline of Art History, Metropolitan Museum
  of Art
• What does that mean?

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The Shang Dynasty, 1700-1100 BCE

• Shang kings ruled from a succession of capitals
  in the Yellow River valley, where archeologists
  have found walled cities, palaces, and vast royal
  tombs.
• Members of the ruling classses possesed the
  bronze technology needed to make weapons.
• In part they maintained their authority by
  claiming to be intermediaries between heaven and
  earth.
• Fertility spirits were honored and regular
  sacrifices were believed necessary to help the
  spirits of the dead.
• Shang tombs reveal a wealthy warrior culture of
  great splendor and violence.

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• One of the most distinctive and characteristic
  images decorating Shang-dynasty bronze vessels is
  the so-called taotie.
• It is a frontal animal-like mask with a prominent
  pair of eyes, often protruding in high relief.
• Between the eyes is a nose, often with nostrils
  at the base.
• Taotie can also include jaws and fangs, horns,
  ears, and eyebrows.
• Currently, the significance of the taotie, as
  well as the other decorative motifs, in Shang
  society is unknown.

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Bronze gui food vessel with animal mask,
excavated from Luoyang, Henan province. Shang
dynasty (c. 1600-1050 BC). The base carries a
two-character inscription xiang (sacrificial
ceremonial) and zhu (storage), identifying it as
a ritual vessel. Bronzes were used by the Shang
aristocracy for ritual purposes.
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Wine jar (pou) with taotie design. H 60.70
cm. Shang, 13th-11th c. BCE Tokyo National
Museum
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Piece Mold Casting

• The earliest Chinese bronzes were made by the
  method known as piece-mold casting?as opposed to
  the lost-wax method, which was used in all other
  Bronze Age cultures.
• In piece-mold casting, a model is made of the
  object to be cast, and a clay mold taken of the
  model.
• The mold is then cut in sections to release the
  model, and the sections are reassembled after
  firing to form the mold for casting.
• If the object to be cast is a vessel, a core has
  to be placed inside the mold to provide the
  vessel's cavity.
• The piece-mold method was most likely the only
  one used in China until at least the end of the
  Shang dynasty.
• An advantage of this rather cumbersome way of
  casting bronze was that the decorative patterns
  could be carved or stamped directly on the inner
  surface of the mold before it was fired.
• This technique enabled the bronze worker to
  achieve a high degree of sharpness and definition
  in even the most intricate designs.

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• Bell
• Eastern Zhou dynasty late Spring and Autumn
  period
• (ca. 770- 475 BCE.) early 5th century BCE China
• Bronze 15 inches
• Sets of bells were an important aspect of Zhou
  bronze production.
• They were used in musical accompaniment for
  ritual ceremonies and for less solemn occasions.
• Ancient clapperless bells, like this one, were
  sounded with mallets

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The Iron Age

• By 1000 BCE iron technology had spread across
  Europe
• Bronze remained the preferred metal, especially
  for luxury goods
• But iron was cheaper and more readily available
• It was commonly used for practical items, such as
  farming tools and weapons
• The blacksmith became a highly valued almost
  magical person

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Iron Age Daggers
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• Works referenced
• Janson, History of Art, Abrams 2001
• Marilyn Stockstads Art History Second Edition
  (Volumes one and two)
• Metropolitan Museum of Arts Timeline of Art
  History. Available online at http//www.metmuseu
  m.org/toah/splash.htm
• Strickland, Carol. The Annotated Mona Lisa. 1992
• The Web Gallery of Art. Available online at
  http//www.wga.hu
• http//www.artchive.com/artchive/E/el_greco.html