Marks of Distinction: Rock Art and Ethnic Identification in the Great Basin

2003 ◽  
Vol 68 (2) ◽  
pp. 372-390 ◽  
Author(s):  
Angus R. Quinlan ◽  
Alanah Woody
Keyword(s):  
Great Basin ◽  
Rock Art ◽  
Ethnic Identification ◽  
Anthropological Theory ◽  
Secure Access ◽  
Art Production

Great Basin ethnography contains little information concerning rock art, suggesting that much of it is pre-Numic. The presence of historic rock art, however, should permit differences between pre-Numic and Numic populations to be identified. Anthropological theory suggests pioneer groups use ritual to socialize the landscape. Rock art may also be associated with colonizing groups to secure access to new resources. Numic populations seem to have responded to pre-Numic rock art through modification of the art. Once the landscape had been re-socialized rock art was generally avoided. This explains why rock art production became sporadic, and memory of it lost.

Shamanism and Rock Art in Far Western North America

1992 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 89-113 ◽  
Author(s):  
David S Whitley
Keyword(s):  
North America ◽  
Great Basin ◽  
Rock Art ◽  
Altered States Of Consciousness ◽  
Late Prehistoric ◽  
Altered States ◽  
Western North America ◽  
States Of Consciousness ◽  
Ethnographic Data ◽  
Art Production

Ethnographic data on the production of rock art in far western North America - the historic hunter-gatherer cultures of California and the Great Basin - are reviewed and analyzed to identify widespread patterns in the origin and, in certain cases, symbolism of the late prehistoric/historical parietal art of this region. These data, collected in the first few decades of this century by a variety of ethnographers, suggest only two origins for the art: production by shamans; and production by initiates in ritual cults. In both instances, the artists were apparently depicting the culturally-conditioned visions or hallucinations they experienced during altered states of consciousness. The symbolism of two sites, Tulare-19 and Ventura-195, is considered in more detail to demonstrate how beliefs about the supernatural world, and the shaman's relationship to this realm, were graphically portrayed.

Time and Rock Art Production:

2016 ◽  
pp. 147-160 ◽  
Author(s):  
Francisco Vergara ◽  
Andrés Troncoso ◽  
Francisca Ivanovic
Keyword(s):  
Rock Art ◽  
Art Production

The case for continuity of human occupation and rock art production in the Kimberley, Australia

2021 ◽  
pp. 194-220
Author(s):  
Peter Veth ◽  
Sam Harper ◽  
Kane Ditchfield ◽  
Sven Ouzman ◽  
Balanggarra Aboriginal
Keyword(s):  
Rock Art ◽  
Human Occupation ◽  
Art Production

From Top Down Under: New Insights into the Social Significance of Superimpositions in the Rock Art of Northern Kimberley, Australia

2019 ◽  
Vol 29 (3) ◽  
pp. 479-495 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ana Paula Motta
Keyword(s):  
Contemporary Art ◽  
Rock Art ◽  
Social Significance ◽  
Top Down ◽  
Supernatural Power ◽  
The Social ◽  
Northwestern Australia ◽  
Art Production ◽  
Cultural Dominance

Rock-art researchers have long acknowledged the importance of discerning superimposition sequences as a means for exploring chronology. Despite their potential for reconstructing painting events and thus informing on a site's production sequences, the social significance of superimpositions and their associated meanings have been little explored. In the Kimberley Region of northwestern Australia, interpretations of superimpositions as an analytical lens have often lingered on the ‘negative’ connotations of this practice (e.g. to destroy supernatural power embedded in previous paintings and/or to show cultural dominance). As a result, it has been proposed that the overpainting of previous images was tantamount to defacing, leading to the proposition that new images constituted a form of vandalism of older art. In this paper, a sample of rock-art sites from the northwestern and northeastern Kimberley is analysed with the aim of grounding the study of superimpositions in more nuanced practices, leading researchers to contemplate the role they played among populations within the same area. It is argued here that superimpositions brought together past and present experiences that served to reinforce the links between contemporary art production and the inherited landscape.

scholarly journals Rock Art Dating and the Peopling of the Americas

2013 ◽  
Vol 2013 ◽  
pp. 1-15 ◽  
Author(s):  
David S. Whitley
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Diversity ◽  
Great Basin ◽  
Rock Art ◽  
Stone Tools ◽  
Stylistic Variation ◽  
Cultural Traditions ◽  
Peopling Of The Americas ◽  
Rock Varnish ◽  
Terminal Pleistocene ◽  
Insight Into

The peopling of the Americas is both the oldest and most frequently researched question in American archaeology. Although rarely considered, early art has the potential to provide insight into questions that may be obscured by other kinds of evidence, particularly stone tools. What part did art play in the peopling of the Americas? This question is addressed starting with a reconsideration of rock varnish chronometrics as applied to Great Basin, eastern California, petroglyphs. This demonstrates, conservatively, that the petroglyph tradition began before 11,100 YBP, probably before 12,600 YBP, and potentially in the 14,000 years range. Comparison of these ages with evidence from other regions in the hemisphere demonstrates substantial artistic and stylistic variation in rock art by the Paleoindian period (circa 10,000–11,000 YBP). This suggests that, while art may have been part of the baggage of the first immigrants, regional cultural traditions had already been developed by the Terminal Pleistocene, if not earlier. The result is evidence for the development of regional cultural diversity in the Americas by Paleoindian times.

scholarly journals Scenes of Human Control of Reindeer in the Alta Rock Art. An Event of Early Domestication in the far North?

2020 ◽  
pp. 121-146
Author(s):  
Ingrid Fuglestvedt
Keyword(s):  
Rock Art ◽  
Phase 1 ◽  
Phase 2 ◽  
Northern Norway ◽  
Social Form ◽  
Wild Game ◽  
Human Control ◽  
Far North ◽  
Art Production

This article focuses on some evident differences between Phase 1 and Phase 2 rock art at Alta in western Finnmark in northern Norway. The earliest period (Phase 1, 5200–4200 cal BC) of rock art production shows numerous scenes in which humans seem to take control of wild game. The compositions of corrals with reindeer inside may be indications of forms of early domestication suggested to have occurred within a context marked by the authority of successful hunters and the influence of emerging inequality. This element of control correlates with an apparent totemic influence in the expressions of rock art. The rock art produced in the succeeding period (Phase 2, 4200-3000 cal BC), however, entirely lacks scenes communicating control of reindeer. This article suggests that this selective absence is an expression of a regained egalitarian social form and a reappraisal of an original animism.

Rock Art, Historical Ontologies, and the Genealogy of Landscape

2019 ◽  
pp. 301-332
Keyword(s):  
Relative Position ◽  
Rock Art ◽  
Social Practices ◽  
Agrarian Communities ◽  
Spatial Attributes ◽  
Rock Paintings ◽  
Art Production ◽  
Historically Situated

Prehispanic ontologies can be conceptualized as historically situated meshworks that unfold particular engagements among humans, other-than-humans, places and substances. The affective and animacy capacities of the participant of these fields of relations are connected to their historical position within them. Through comparing the visual, technical, and spatial attributes of rock art production during 3,500 years in Valle El Encanto (Chile), we describe how the manufacture of rock paintings and petroglyphs unfolded different fields of relations. Based on the above, this chapter discusses how these particular meshworks were related to specific historical landscapes and two different ontologies: one related to hunter-gatherer groups and another to Andean-agrarian communities. The transformation identified in Valle El Encanto allows us to discuss the historical replacement of ontologies, as well as how social practices and the affective and animacy capacities of other-than-humans, places and substances changed their relative position within the fields of relation throughout history.

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