The technique used to present perspective and motion in cave paintings has impressed both experts and laymen. Laboring away in the dimly lit recesses of their caves, prehistoric man recreated details of shape and form that would do credit to artists of any epoch in the history of painting. The beautiful paintings they left behind have raised several questions. What motivated our primitive hunter ancestors to depict the animals that inhabited their world and why did they do so with such flair and artistry? Why did they create works of art that went far beyond the merely functional? Why were they made in the very depths of caves?

       The meanings of the pictures have been the subject of much speculation and debate among experts. Interpretations range from the sacred and mysterious, the spiritual or religious to games or a celebration of life or an attempt to communicate with spirits. The art may have had a wide range of significance including tribal stories, myths of creation or renewal, sacred beings, rites of passage such as puberty, and death and rebirth. We are too far removed in time to truly understand what the pictures may have meant to those ancient people. Art, after all, is part of a complex structure of beliefs and rituals, morals and social codes, a structure in which magic and science, myth and history, are indistinct.

         Since art must always be seen within the ecological and social aspects of each period and culture, most prehistoric art research can only deal in probabilities. The most recent explanation however, is that Stone Age art was essentially shamanic (1). In primitive societies around the world, people in need have sought to contact the spirit world to obtain assistance with the difficulties of daily life. Their need to exercise some sort of control over their environment, health, and destiny (foretell the future, restore health, change the weather, control the movement of animals, converse with spirits and spirit animals) made them turn to shamans. They believe the shaman has the unique ability to enter into a trance, travel into the spirit world, and accomplish the task desired.

       But over and above our need to understand or interpret their significance, the cave paintings bring home an important truth: the esthetic urge in man is not a recent refinement of civilization but part of an ancient deep-seated need at creative expression that is unique to the human psyche.


                                                                                                                Rachel Hajar, MD
                                                                                                                E-mail:rachel@hmc.or
       Reference:
                                
      
1. Clottes J, Lewis-Williams D. The shamans of prehistory. Trance and magic in the painted caves. New York, Harry N Abrams, Inc., 1998.



                 Photo sources: Chauvet JM, Deschamps EB, Hillaire C. Dawn of Art: The Cauvet Cave. New York, Harry N. Abrams, Inc.,1996.
Clottes J, Lewis-Williams D. The Shamans of Prehistory. Trance and magic in the painted caves. New York, Harry N. Abrams, Inc., 1998.

                           

  
                                                           “A book is like a garden carried in the pocket.”
                                                                                                               Chinese Proverb