Art is not just a mere mark on a cave, or paper, or material, it's a mark on history. It can be anything that depicts your emotions. It could be a piece of writing, a drawing, or a painting. Today we use paper and pencil and blogs on computers to express our feelings. But how did prehistoric people show expression? They had no paper or pencil or computer. All they had was the environment, the plants, the animals, and each other, so they made use of what they had. They used the inner walls of the caves as a canvas and crushed minerals and plants to create colors, which showed that they had a vast knowledge of plants, dyes, colors, wax, oil, charcoal, and composition. They invented crude paint brushes made out of fur, moss, and human hair and made carving tools out of rock. With all these tools prehistoric men and women created sculptures and cave paintings. Even a simple cave painting of a hunting scene can be a glimpse of the past. A basic hand print on a cave wall can determine just how big or small these early humans were and how we evolved and how they used their fingers as tools to do tasks and communicate.Some paintings depict hunting and death scenes which tell us that people, long ago, had an understanding of life and death and had respect for nature and other fellow beings. Dwellings in caves enforce the fact that these humans were adaptable to even the hardest of environment and changes. Over time they became smart and strong and innovative and were able to adjust to different changes, as there brain and physical form developed.
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| Prehistoric art tools |
Cave paintings are not just primitive scribbles on cave walls, they have a much deeper meaning. They are snapshots of life before filled with hidden meanings and riddles that we, as the current holders of the future, should solve and make sense out of. Each cave painting was important to the different tribes or groups of prehistoric people and each painting was made precisely by the artist to reflect his thoughts and the culture of his society. There are paintings in France and Spain that represent a hunt scene. Analyzing these paintings help us figure out what tools prehistoric people used to hunt with, what animals they hunted, what their diet was, what animals existed then, and how the prehistoric people worked in groups and communities. Scientists think that back then paintings were said to have special powers and that artists were spiritual beings. Some scientists believe cave paintings were painted to worship or please the gods, so many of the cave paintings looked magical. The paintings in the Ajanta Ellora caves in India depict everyday life, family values, and what clothes and jewelry people wore at that time. We can study the cave paintings in Ajanta Ellora caves and learn about the men long ago and their life style, beliefs, heroes, and religion. The paintings of the Minoan civilizations on the island of Crete, from the 27th century, show natural disasters such as volcanoes and earthquakes. Egyptian tomb paintings show the different gods that the Egyptians worshiped. Cave sculptures can represent the different tribes or could have been used in traditional celebrations like the clay sculptures in France.
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| Egyptians gods |
Through the ages people have used art to express their feelings and prehistoric people have done this successfully. If they had not painted on the cave walls or sculpted statues out of rock and mud, we would not have had known about the prehistoric history of man, of how they evolved over time into what we are today, or of how they survived without the technology and conveniences that we have now. We would not have known what prehistoric people thought or believed in. We would not have known what animals lived at that time. We would not have known the culture of our ancestors. Without emotion, art, creativity, and culture we would not have come this far today. The prehistoric people through their art have left an everlasting impression, so that mankind can trace back to their ancestors and move forward by learning from the past.
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