Monday! A good day to learn about cave paintings :)
As you can see by Itzl's concerned look, this group is for us to check in at to let people know we are alive, doing OK, and not affected by such things as heat, blizzards, floods, wild fires, hurricanes, tornadoes, power outages, or other such things that could keep us off DKos. It's also so we can find other Kossacks nearby for in-person checks when other methods of communication fail - a buddy system. Members come here to check in. If you're not here, or anywhere else on DKos, and there are adverse conditions in your area (floods, heatwaves, hurricanes, etc.), we and your buddy are going to check up on you. If you are going to be away from your computer for a day or a week, let us know here. We care!
We have split up the publishing duties, but we welcome everyone in IAN to do daily diaries for the group! Every member is an editor, so anyone can take a turn when they have something to say, photos and music to share, a cause to promote or news!
If you'd like to be part of the Itzl Alert Network, please leave a comment asking to join, or send us a message asking to join. We'd love to have you. The bigger our network, the less likely someone will be stranded all alone.
Red Bull
The cave paintings in the caves at Altamira, approximately 20,000 years old, are now open to the public again on a limited basis.
Spain's Culture Ministry announced this week that the site would be reopened from the end of the year, a move scientists said carried "immeasurable" risks.
Discovered in 1879, the vast caves in the Cantabria region of northern Spain, dubbed the "Sistine chapel of Paleolithic art", are covered in paintings of herds of European bison, bulls and other animals.
They were first closed in 1977, after scientists discovered that the paintings in red, ochre and black were being damaged by carbon dioxide from the breath of the huge numbers of visitors.
More
Lascaux is home to some of the most extraordinary and vibrant cave paintings:
An image from Lascaux
Lascaux is famous for its Palaeolithic cave paintings, found in a complex of caves in the Dordogne region of southwestern France, because of their exceptional quality, size, sophistication and antiquity. Estimated to be up to 20,000 years old, the paintings consist primarily of large animals, once native to the region. Lascaux is located in the Vézère Valley where many other decorated caves have been found since the beginning of the 20th century (for example Les Combarelles and Font-de-Gaume in 1901, Bernifal in 1902). Lascaux is a complex cave with several areas (Hall of the Bulls, Passage gallery) It was discovered on 12 September 1940 and given statutory historic monument protection in december of the same year. In 1979, several decorated caves of the Vézère Valley - including the Lascaux cave - were added to the UNESCO World Heritage Sites list.
Sections have been identified in the cave; the Great Hall of the Bulls, the Lateral Passage, the Shaft of the Dead Man, the Chamber of Engravings, the Painted Gallery, and the Chamber of Felines. The cave contains nearly 2,000 figures, which can be grouped into three main categories - animals, human figures and abstract signs. Most of the major images have been painted onto the walls using mineral pigments although some designs have also been incised into the stone.
Of the animals, equines predominate [364]. There are 90 paintings of stags. Also represented are cattle, bison, felines, a bird, a bear, a rhinoceros, and a human. Among the most famous images are four huge, black bulls or aurochs in the Hall of the Bulls. One of the bulls is 17 feet (5.2 m) long - the largest animal discovered so far in cave art.
Lascaux
The Chauvet caves are even older than Lascaux, dating back about 32,000 years.
An astonishing rhino
The other day, I saw Werner Herzog’s new 3-D movie about the Chauvet cave paintings — Cave of Forgotten Dreams. The Times reviewer doesn’t agree, but I thought it was a terrible movie: the 3-D effects will give you a headache (especially scenes shot in the cramped spaces of the cave), the music is an obnoxious distraction, there are too many irrelevant, sometimes silly, interruptions, and the movie is self-indulgent and heavy-handed — typical Herzog Germanic romanticism. BUT SEE IT! It’s well worth putting up with Herzog’s nonsense just for the opportunity to see the Chauvet cave paintings.
Due to the fragile nature of the cave and artifacts, custody of the cave was taken over by the French Government (the official government website for the cave is here), and it has been closed to all but a few experts since its discovery in 1994 by the French speleologist Jean-Marie Chauvet and his colleagues Eliette Brunel Deschamps and Christian Hillaire. Herzog persuaded the French government to give him, and a crew of three, access to the cave to film for four days on the condition he worked under careful supervision.
These paintings might be the oldest art ever discovered, possibly an incredible 32,000 years-old - twice as old as the next oldest, the Lascaux caves. But, the thing that’s so remarkable about this work, and other prehistoric cave painting, is it’s as good as any art that’s ever been made. In other words, art hasn’t improved in 32,000 years; it's just changed.
The Chauvet Caves
But now it seems that even earlier cave paintings, by a Neanderthal artist, have been discovered in Spain:
Six seals, painted 42,000 years ago.
The world's oldest works of art have been found in a cave on Spain's Costa del Sol, scientists believe.
Six paintings of seals are at least 42,000 years old and are the only known artistic images created by Neanderthal man, experts claim.
Professor Jose Luis Sanchidrian, from the University of Cordoba, described the discovery as 'an academic bombshell', as all previous art work has been attributed to Homo sapiens.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/...
And, of course, I would be remiss not to mention the "Ancient Astronaut" cave paintings:
Prehistoric alien astronauts, Val Calmonica. Maybe.
Source
And: FWIW
Cave paintings have been found in Pakistan and the US, too.
I might do a diary on aliens in ancient art some time :) I haven't decided whether I believe in aliens at all, but it would be a fun topic. Hope that everyone has a good Monday!