Stoneage Artists Created Prehistoric Movies

Yes! They used‭ ‬cartoon-like techniques to give the impression that wild beasts were trotting or running across cave walls‬...

That what a "new"* (see at the end of the article) study‭, from two French researchers (archaeologist Marc Azéma of the University of Toulouse–Le Mirail in France and independent French artist Florent Rivère) argued: about‭ ‬30,000‭ ‬years ago Paleolithic artists used "animation effects" in their paintings.

According to the researchers, this would explain multiple heads or limbs on some cave paintings.

"Prehistoric man foreshadowed one of the fundamental characteristics of visual perception, retinal persistence," Azéma and Rivère wrote.

Azéma, who spent ‭ ‬20‭ ‬years researching Stone Age animation techniques,‭ isolated 53 ‬figures in‭ ‬12‭ ‬French caves which superimpose two or more images to represent trot or gallop,‭ ‬head tossing and tail shaking.‭

"Lascaux is the cave with the greatest number of cases of split-action movement by superimposition of successive images. Some 20 animals, principally horses, have the head, legs or tail multiplied," Azéma said.

When the paintings are viewed by flickering torchlight, the animated effect "achieves its full impact," said Azéma.

"That such animation was intentional is endorsed by the likely use of incised disks as thaumatropes," he added.

Rivère examined Magdalenian bone discs -- objects found in the Pyrenees, the north of Spain and the Dordogne which measure about 1.50 inches in diameter.

Often pierced in their centre, the discs have been generally interpreted as buttons or pendants.

"Given that some are decorated on both sides with animals shown in different positions, we realized that another type of use, relating to sequential animation, was possible," the researchers said.

* Source is Discovery News, however, it was known since 2005: it is based on Azéma’s Ph.D. thesis research, which he summarized in a 2005 paper for the International Newsletter On Rock Art, which is edited by French cave art expert Jean Clottes.

Azéma shows how cave artists created the sensation of movement in the animals they drew both by superimposing multiple numbers of legs, heads, and other body parts and by orienting groups of animals in dynamic ways that suggest motion, which is similar to what animators do today. In the Lascaux Cave, for example, some 20 horses were drawn with multiple heads, legs, or tails. One Lascaux horse was drawn with five superimposed heads and several manes. Similar techniques were used at La Marche Cave in France’s Vienne department, where a horse was drawn with so many heads, tails, and backsides that it looks like a blur on the cave wall.



Azéma finds such animation techniques even in the earliest known cave art, at the 32,000-year-old Chauvet Cave in the French Ardèche (see panel above), where a bison is drawn with eight legs. Azéma even suggests that the artist who painted Chauvet’s famous Horse Panel, which features four superbly drawn horses’ heads, might have intended to depict one horse in motion—although he adds that it is not possible to know for sure.

Originally posted by elevenaugust
Azéma even suggests that the artist who painted Chauvet’s famous Horse Panel, which features four superbly drawn horses’ heads, might have intended to depict one horse in motion—although he adds that it is not possible to know for sure.

edit on 9-6-2012 by elevenaugust because: (no reason given)

The animation aspect is interesting, but what's even more interesting is the picture of the rhinoceros with horses from a painting made in a French Cave possibly around 30,000 years ago? What's up with that? Rhino's are considerably south and in sub-Sahara Africa, the last I checked anyway. It makes me question the age of these prehistoric murals, unless of course there is a logical explanation?

Cheers - Dave

reply to post by bobs_uruncle

Rhino's are considerably south and in sub-Sahara Africa, the last I checked anyway. It makes me question the age of these prehistoric murals, unless of course there is a logical explanation?

Rhinos were not indigenous to just Africa 30 000 years ago they were on many continents

Cran

reply to post by bobs_uruncle

Are you saying that the animal depicted at the bottom left is a rhino? It could also be a warthog, multiple tusks are present on some warthogs but the curl kinda hints at it too maybe.



Some warthogs have 3 and 4 sets of tusks too. Just a thought.

I wonder if they considered the effect of torches and cooking fires being used in the caves on the drawings.

No doubt the flickering of a naked flame had an effect on drawings. The artists may indeed have been wondering story tellers who used various techniques to bring their stories to life.

reply to post by bobs_uruncle

Yes, it's a rhino, and you can find lots of others rhino's representation as well in the Chauvet Cave:

Two species survived the most recent period of glaciation and inhabited Europe as recently as 10,000 years ago.

Source

I would say it works when the air is thick with smoke, the smells of the wild game wafting about (blood and otherwise), and the swirling mind's eye from the use of hallucinogens with flickering light of fire and the movements of the participants.

I bet they could see the animals moving about in real time as they recanted their tales and fed the spirits within. Very intense!

reply to post by elevenaugust



I'd like to see all those who call man of that period primitive to all get out their pencils and paper and try drawing those animals as well as they did....

There were surely exceptionally talented artists alive at the time. This period of history, and its art, has always fascinated me since early childhood. These people knew and drew every detail of animals that we, as modern people, will never see in true life, like the wooly rhino and the mammoth.

If anybody hasn't seen Werner Herzog's Cave of Forgotten Dreams, shot in France's famous Chauvet Cave I highly recommend you check it out. It's absolutely stunning, both the film itself and the subject matter.

reply to post by LightSpeedDriver


They're definitely rhinos. These people were known to hunt and kill them, and even looking at the images they recorded it's clear what they are. There's no mistaking it.

reply to post by Monger

I stand corrected.

They were French movies? Were they all in black and white, with people chain smoking in coffee shops, fraught with esoteric symbolism, always ending with 'Fin'?

Originally posted by MI5edtoDeath
I wonder if they considered the effect of torches and cooking fires being used in the caves on the drawings.

No doubt the flickering of a naked flame had an effect on drawings. The artists may indeed have been wondering story tellers who used various techniques to bring their stories to life.

Did they consider it? Probably:

When the paintings are viewed by flickering torchlight, the animated effect "achieves its full impact," said Azéma.

Man in the past had the same intelligence as we do today. It was a different age. A natural age. The earth population was recovering from the ice age.

Are their any 'lost' tribes out there that leave cave art in the present day?

This is super cool! I just wish the video showed the images with the flickering firelight, so we could see the effect for ourselves.

Originally posted by MI5edtoDeath
I wonder if they considered the effect of torches and cooking fires being used in the caves on the drawings.

No doubt the flickering of a naked flame had an effect on drawings. The artists may indeed have been wondering story tellers who used various techniques to bring their stories to life.

That's actually a really good question!!! With the alternating flicker, it could make their eyes focus on different areas and definitely make them seem like they were moving

Originally posted by PurpleChiten

Originally posted by MI5edtoDeath
I wonder if they considered the effect of torches and cooking fires being used in the caves on the drawings.

No doubt the flickering of a naked flame had an effect on drawings. The artists may indeed have been wondering story tellers who used various techniques to bring their stories to life.

That's actually a really good question!!! With the alternating flicker, it could make their eyes focus on different areas and definitely make them seem like they were moving

Sweet Jeesus, are you kidding me?

Thats the entire god damned point of the article!

Read. Before. You. Post.

reply to post by SLAYER69


Got to agree with you big time..

Just the ability to draw in this manner is not only showing superior skill, but also memory, technique and an importance of wanting to preserve the images for future generations.

There is so much more going on here than meets the eye.

I could not do that. Given the tools they had at the time, just gives you more of an impact as to how clever these images are, and the people who painted them.

IMO, these pictures have come from a knowledge far beyond the time they were painted. These would have been skills that must have been taught and passed down along a chain of decades, perhaps hundreds, of years. This is not something you just up and do when you feel like it.

My problem with that, though, is where are the very first ones? Why do we see superb art like this, but very little of 'stick men and stick animals'?
Where is the progression from very basic images to this type of colourful artisitic expression?

Did we have some form of society before we became 'cavemen'? Are these skills the remains of something that was, in itself, far superior to the time of the cave artists?

Incredible pictures.. needs far more research done on them.

Originally posted by stanguilles7

Originally posted by PurpleChiten

Originally posted by MI5edtoDeath
I wonder if they considered the effect of torches and cooking fires being used in the caves on the drawings.

No doubt the flickering of a naked flame had an effect on drawings. The artists may indeed have been wondering story tellers who used various techniques to bring their stories to life.

That's actually a really good question!!! With the alternating flicker, it could make their eyes focus on different areas and definitely make them seem like they were moving

Sweet Jeesus, are you kidding me?

Thats the entire god damned point of the article!

Read. Before. You. Post.

I used to, but found out this weekend we're not supposed to, so I'm giving it a whirl ....

Originally posted by SLAYER69
reply to post by elevenaugust

 

I'd like to see all those who call man of that period primitive to all get out their pencils and paper and try drawing those animals as well as they did....

Absolutely my friend. The mind of man, even in its most simple state, is not primitive. Ours is a mind capable of abstract thought. Not just capable, but wired completely for abstract thought. To such a degree that concrete thinking is considered a symptom of mental illness.

This is a great thread, proposing a great concept that honestly has me thinking. Great post, OP.

I held a torch up to your av Tex
scared me