ART APPRECIATION
CAVE ART
| ORIGIN, PURPOSE, HISTORY AND PLACES, INFLUENCE
CAVE ART (A BRIEF EXPLANATION)
- Cave art is also known as Paleolithic art
- It is a broad term for the earliest known artmaking in human
history.
- This movement is perhaps best known today for the paintings
found on the walls of many prehistoric caves, rich in depiction of
animals, human figures, and forms that are a combination of man
and beast.
- Paleolithic art was made with the limited materials that were
available at the time. This includes natural pigments such as ochre
and charcoal applied to cave walls by using plants or the artists'
hands as brushes.
CAVE ART | ORIGIN
• When we speak of when the Cave Art originated, we cannot
accurately and approximately date the time of when it was created.
However, archaeologists and scientists studied the caves and the
rocks that were used as a medium of their paintings and
engravings.
• They were, therefore, able to tell that the cave paintings were
created between 43,000 and 65,000 years ago – 20,000 years
before modern humans arrived in Europe.
• It is impossible to state exactly when Homo sapiens (or the so-
called “Modern Humans”) began to create works of art, but famous
examples of their works of Cave Art date back to at least 40,000
B.C.E.
• However, the oldest known cave art was actually created by
Neanderthals (Homo neanderthalensis), a species closely related to
us, in around 63,000 BCE.
• HOW
o Cave painters used the pigments that came from minerals
available around them. Such that, paints was made from
dirt or charcoal from the fire or burnt bones mixed with spit
or animal fat. Moreover, they used brushes that were made
from 'animal hair'.
o The first paintings in caves were line drawings made of dark
charcoal, a byproduct from burning wood, and used to draw
primitive symbols. The indigenous people had access to
plenty of charcoal, regardless of where they lived in the
world, using wood for the fire was their primary cooking
source and how they kept warm. To color the animals on
the walls, as they became more experienced, they used
additional natural elements found abundantly on the
ground or in rocks
o Cave paintings were created by mixing together different
colored rocks, charcoal, animal blood, and berries. These
ingredients would then be ground up into a paste by
melting them over a fire. A liberal application of spit or
animal fat would then be added to make the paste nice and
gloopy
CAVE ART | PURPOSE
1. For the purpose of worshipping their gods and performing rituals.
o During the Paleolithic Era (Old Stone Age), Cave art is
generally considered to have a symbolic or religious
function.
o The main purpose of painting or engraving symbols and
figures into the cave wall is to worship their gods (or even
the animals itself). They believed that animals, like humans,
had life and were therefore God-like and this was a place of
worship.

o The exact meanings of the images remain unknown, but
some experts think they may have been created within the
framework of shamanic beliefs and practices.
o There are theories and assumptions made by archaeologists
and scientists that their cave is a sacred rite where they
perform their rituals and worship the paintings on their cave
walls.
2. For the purpose of hunting and survival.
o Hunting was critical to early human’s survival, and animal
art in caves has often been interpreted as an attempt to
influence the success of hunt, exert power over animals that
were simultaneously dangerous to earl humans and vital to
their existence, or to increase the fertility of herds in the
wild.
o Some archeologists say they used to drew animals as a way
to ensure they would hunt them. It seems they think that if
they could capture the image of the animal, they already
have won it and would be able to hunt it easily.
3. For the purpose of art itself.
o Some archaeologists even speculated that early humans
were keen and are able to observe the beauty of their
surroundings. They are, then, believed to have drawn such
paintings to admire and capture the beauty of their
surroundings.
CAVE ART | HISTORY AND PLACES
History and Origin of Cave Art
STONE AGE (6000 B.C)
Paleolithic Era (The Old Stone Age)
• The people in this era lived in cave. Practicing a lot of hunting and
gathering for their food as a way to survive.
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A. African Caves
• Blombos Cave – South Africa
o The Blombos Cave is located on the southern-most tip of
South Africa and dated between 70,000 to 100,000
years old.
o A variety of art discovered inside these caves range from
engraved bones, necklaces of marine shell beads,
engraved ochre remains, to over 500 fragments of stone
tool
Carved ochre – Blombos Cave
• Apollo II – Namibia
o A cave known to natives as Goachanas is located in
Namibia, Africa, set up high on a ridge overlooking the
Nuob river in the Huns Mountains.
o It was used for thousands of years by indigenous people
and only through British imperialism, was it known to
the world. The English name was given to the cave by a
British archeologist who was in the cave when he heard
the Apollo 11 successfully landed on the moon in 1969.
Stone slab from Apollo 11
B. Asian Caves
• Damaidi – China
o The Damaidi Cave contains over 3170 sets of
petroglyphs and over 8,000 pieces of art, which

historians consider to be a selection of the origin of the
Chinese characters used in writing today.
o They used the caves and outcrops of rock to record their
daily life and the living conditions by etching images into
the rock and filling them with pigment.
• Bhimbetka – India
o The oldest cave art in India located at the Bhimbetka
rock shelters dating to 30,000 BCE. Displayed on the
walls is the culture of India, with people dancing a
cultural tradition lasting through the archeological
record.
C. European Caves
• Chauvet – France
o In 1994, Jean-Marie Chauvet searched and finally found
one of the most important prehistoric caves in the
world. The cave was sealed for over 36,000 years and
held over 100,000 drawings, providing information and
giving us more understanding about the lives of the
indigenous people of the region.
o The Chauvet Cave is unique from other cave art because
the indigenous artists scraped or cleaned the surface of
the walls before drawing on them. Cleaning the walls
allowed the medium (paint) to adhere to the wall,
preserving the quality of the drawings over time. The
Chauvet Cave is also home to animal drawings that
interact with each other, as seen in the painting of lions.
Painting of lions
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• Lascaux – France
o Archeologists have been discovering prehistoric caves
over the last few centuries; however, some are found
entirely by accident. (FUN FACT BEHIND STORY) In 1940,
a tree fell, leaving a significant deep depression in the
ground. Three boys and dog were out for a hike and
discovered the hole when their dog fell into the cave.
The three boys scampered in after their dog and
stepped back 17,000 years in time. The boys and their
dog continued to play in the cave for two years before
they reported their discovery to an archeologist.
o The Lascaux Cave in France became an instant tourist
attraction and was considered the most significant
discovery of cave art to date.
o The Lascaux Cave is similar to the Chauvet Cave
geologically, and the painted animals are similar.
• El Castillo – Spain
o Several caves in Spain, including the El Castillo Cave,
were explored to determine if sound or music had a part
of the painting ritual in the caves. The research group
went into the caves and used items the indigenous
people accessed and created music by playing the
stalactites.
o One of the paintings was dated to 40,000 BCE and is a
primitive red stippled disk. The cave yields many
handprints, and a study of the finger length ratios led
scientists to consider the stenciled handprints are

primarily from women’s hands, challenging the belief
that only men created cave art.
D. Oceania Caves
• Nawarla Gabarnmang Rock Shelf – Australia
o The Nawarla Gabarnmang Shelter, located in Kakadu
Park, Australia, is another example of detailed drawing,
painting, and carving on rock surfaces.
o The walls, ceilings, and columns of the Shelter show
mural paintings of detailed images of crocodiles,
wallabies, kangaroos, and humans.
• Sulawesi Cave – Indonesia
o The Sulawesi Cave in Indonesia has many paintings by
indigenous artists from 39,900 BCE, making them some
of the oldest in the world.
E. South American Caves
• Cueva de las Manos – Argentina
o Pattern can also refer to repetition, and in the Cueva de
Las Manos cave in Argentina, the pattern of handprints
adorns the wall.
o The prints were made by people thousands of years ago
when they sprayed pigment and water from their mouth
over a hand and then held against the rock. The hand is
pulled away, and the paint surrounds the hand giving
the impression several people are waving their hands in
the air. Most of the prints completed between 13,000
and 9500 BCE, showing depictions of animals and
hunting scenes.
CAVE ART | IMPORTANCE AND INFLUENCES
• Cave art connects contemporary artists with a primal
perspective, clearing the clutter of modern life. Inspired by the
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art of their ancestors, such artists bring elements from pre-
historic art to their contemporary works.
• Cave paintings illustrate the human need to communicate. This
communication takes its form in leaving a mark for the future-
to help guide, or communicate something so important that it
needs a permanent representation.
• The significance of cave paintings is that they give us ideas of
how intelligent and cultural the inhabitants of the caves in
question were. The people who drew these cave paintings not
only left behind evidence that they were advanced enough to
paint on the cave walls, but also left behind evidence of their
activities and what they found important enough to make
paintings of. Prehistoric cave-art is important as it serves as
some of the best means of showing the interaction between
our primitive ancestors and the world as they perceived it.
• These people painted mostly animals that they most likely
hunted as a major source of food, and in doing so left behind
evidence of their activities. The paintings that have been
discovered offer valuable evidence of our history. Cave painting
was the people of the pasts' version of documentation. Cave
art is significant because it was what people in prehistoric times
did in order to record history and culture. But, prehistoric cave
art was also significant because it also served as a warning to
people who were to come later. For example, they could show
the way to kill a beast or warn them of a beast.
KEY IDEAS & ACCOMPLISHMENTS
• Paleolithic art is found throughout the world and on every
continent except Antarctica.
• The tradition of cave art also includes relief carvings and portable
sculptural objects. The art created by our earliest ancestors is at
one level alien and deeply mysterious to us, and yet it serves as a
reminder of the common humanity we share with its creators. It
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rarely fails to dazzle and astound with its meticulous detail, abstract • In December 2019, however, figurative cave paintings depicting pig
gestures, and rich scope for imaginative speculation on its meaning hunting in the Maros-Pangkep karst in Sulawesi were estimated to
and origin. be even older, at least 43,900 years old. The finding was noted to
• Paleolithic art was made with the limited materials that were be "the oldest pictorial record of storytelling and the earliest
available at the time. This includes natural pigments such as ochre figurative artwork in the world".[11][12]
and charcoal applied to cave walls by using plants or the artists'
hands as brushes. Mixtures and powders would also have been
blown onto walls through reed-like tubes or using the mouth, while
portable objects were often carved out of animal tusks such as
those of mammoths, using pieces of flint or rock.

CONCLUSION:
There's no exactly found evidence yet regarding this but most common
explanation from theorists is that humans back in these eras paint in caves
as a form of ritual to increase the number of animals in contribution to
their hunting and gathering practices. Another theory says that they
wanted to document their hunting expeditions. And lastly, it is found that
the paintings were made by shamans.

RECENT DISCOVERIES

• The oldest are often constructed from hand stencils and simple
geometric shapes. However, more recently, in 2021, cave art of a
pig found in an Indonesian island, and dated to over 45,500 years
ago, has been reported.
• In November 2018, scientists reported the discovery of the then-
oldest known figurative art painting, over 40,000 (perhaps as old as
52,000) years old, of an unknown animal, in the cave of Lubang
Jeriji Saléh on the Indonesian island of Borneo