Paleolithic Art
Prehistoric Europe
Chapter 1
Paleolithic lecture Terms/Concepts
you’ll need to understand & remember:
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Paleolithic (Old Stone Age)
Shaman
Sculpture in-the-round (fully 3-D)
incising/etching
Relief carving
Modeling
Ochers
Negative vs. positive images
Twisted perspective/profile
groundline
Concave/convex surfaces
3,000,000 BCE human face in pebble,
Makapansgat, South Africa
400,000 years old
Upper Paleolithic
• 40,000 – 8,000 BCE
• Migratory hunter-gatherers
• Cave paintings
– As early as 30,000 BCE
– especially 16,000-12,000 BCE
• Retreat of glacial ice
about 11,000-8,000 years ago
Human with feline head,
Hohlenstein-Stadl, Germany
30,000-28,000 BCE. Ivory. Almost 1’
Nude Woman (Venus of Willendorf)
28,000-25,000 BCE. Limestone. 4 ¼”
Laussel Woman holding bison horn
25,000-20,000 BCE.
Limestone. 1’6”
Reclining Nude,
La Magdaleine Cave, France, 15,000- 10,000 BCE
Two bison, Le Tuc d’Audoubert
15,000-10,000 BCE. Clay. 2’ long
Relief sculpture
• Figures projecting from a background to which
they’re attached (the ground is cut away/down)
• Low relief projects out only a little.
• High relief projects out more and is more fully
3-D.
• In sunken relief, the image outline or the image
itself is cut below the surface so the image does
not project beyond the background surface.
Ivory Bison 12,000 BCE. 4”
Aurochs, horses and rhinos,
Chauvet
30,000-28,000 or 15,000-13,000 BCE
megaceros
Footprint of an 8-year-old boy,
27,000 years old,
Chauvet Cave
Bisons, Altamira, Spain.
12,000-11,000 BCE
Painting Materials:
• Ocher chunks
• Ground ochers (red, brown, yellow) or manganese mixed
with animal fat or marrow
– Red ochers/hematite
– Burned bones (charcoal) for black
• Fingers, reeds, animal hair, twigs or bristles for brushes
• Blowpipes of reeds or hollow bones
• Sharp incising rocks
• Scaffolding and oil lamps
Pech-Merle horses, France
22,000 BCE. 11’2” long
Hall of the Bulls, Lascaux, France
15,000-13,000 BCE
Hall of the Bulls, Lascaux
15,000-13,000 BCE
Chinese horses, Lascaux
Wounded man and bison, Lascaux
15,000-13,000 BCE
Next:
Neolithic Art