"Making Sense"?

Making sense” of anything is a hard task to accomplish, because there is so much information and data that an audience may not have at hand. This is even more evident when trying to interpret or “make sense” a creation when the people and culture of it are long past, specifically cave paintings. This is because there is certain data, that can only now be obtained from the interpretation of the audience, more specifically the archeologists. The problem here though, is that these are just educated guesses at best, by themselves, but there are other pieces of data that can higher the percentage of a correct interpretation.
Obviously the biggest reason for “making sense” of cave paintings, is to try to figure out what the uses for them may have be to our ancient ancestors, show that we may obtain more insight to their way of life, their culture, and their history. They took great consideration when considering what caves to use, both from a practical stand point as well as what could be seen as aesthetic or theatrical purpose. We may never know for sure, though. The same could be said about the placement of the paintings and the use of the surfaces, and the specific rooms, as I talked about in last weeks post. I think these considerations are important when trying to “make sense” of any art, but even more so for the art of cultures that are not hear to give us all the answers. These parts of the data, including the size of each work, the subjects used, the placement of each piece, the use of the area, the relationships between each work, and so many other pieces of ethological data.
When looking at this data, it has been in popular opinion that the cave paintings are religious in nature. It has also been considered that there were a type of record keeping, since they had no written language (that we know of) at this time; so the paintings were a way for them to record maybe their observations, lessons to pass on, their experience in life, etc. There are a few other hypothesis’, but I think these are the two that have the most credence. Or rather, I think the two of them together can best explain the evidence and data that we have been able to find. The one thing we can know for sure is that these paintings were important to their culture in some way or another. When “making sense” of anything, one has to consider the context the data is found in as well. All these things are important to know, and think about, as archeologists continue on their mission of “making sense” prehistoric art, particularly cave paintings.

The importance of location

“Lascaux was carefully chosen as the proper place for these elaborate paintings (92).”
In the beginning of chapter 4, Gregory Curtis discusses the fact that the artists were very aware of their surroundings, which I really enjoy. For cave paintings the surface of the rock, the placement of the cave, the sizes of each alcove, the surrounding area and many other important natural aspects would have been considered by the artist, the placement was just as important as the actual cave paintings. Our teacher Rebecca Roberts talked to us about her own experience with cave paintings and specifically a scene where a stampede of animals are painted and if the audience can envision the flickering of light from torches, then the stampede actually comes to life. To achieve this the artists would have been aware of each placement of each animal, and at what height to anticipate where the shadows of the light would have reached, to achieve the greatest appreciation.
I think that when most people think of cave paintings, the majority of the audience does not consider how much work the artists would have put into each cavern and into each individual painting. Sometimes they do not even consider the fact that these paintings would have had specific important uses in the cultures of the artist, they think of ‘primitive’ art as being unsophisticated and just entertainment for the artist. This is obviously completely untrue, just from the fact that there is evidence that “suggests that ancient people must have entered the cave and explored it sometime before the paintings were made (92).” This evidence shows that the ancient artists were scoping out their canvas before deciding if the caves would be acceptable for what they were intending. These paintings were important to them, and they did not take the picking of their canvas lightly.
The placement of the cave was important as well, more for a practical use. The cave “,like a cathedral built on a cliff above a village, looks out over all the surrounding countryside (93),” enabling the people using it to essentially maintain continual watch and observation. It may have even enabled them to make certain observations that would later become pieces of their art work. It also would have helped with hunting and staying safe. The cave was a vantage point safely tucked away from the outside world and its distractions. As Curtis states “the cave was perfectly suited to their needs and intentions (93),” and these are important aspects to be taken into account when creating archaeological interpretations in what uses these cave paintings may or may not have had in ancient culture.