The Cave Painters: Probing the Mysteries of the World's First Artists
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The Cave Painters: Probing the Mysteries of the World's First Artists
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In his new book, Gregory Curtis introduces us to the spectacular cave paintings of France and Spain—to the men and women who rediscovered them, to the varied theories about their origins, to their remarkable beauty and their continuing fascination.
He takes us with him on his own journey of discovery, making us see the astonishing sophistication and power of the paintings, telling us what is known about their creators, the Cro-Magnon people who settled the area some 40,000 years ago.
In his own search for the caves’ meaning, Curtis takes us through the major theories—that the art was part of fertility or hunting rituals, or used for religious or shamanistic purposes, or was clan mythology—examining the ways in which ethnography, archaeology, and religion have influenced the thinking about the cave paintings over time.
The Cave Painters is rich in detail, personalities, and history—and permeated with the mystery at the core of this art created so many thousands of years ago by human beings who had developed, perhaps for the first time, both the ability for abstract thought and a profound and beautiful way to express it.