Aesthetics & Rock Art

Rock art research, the study of paintings and drawings on rock surfaces made by peoples from time immemorial up to the present, is a field that is growing in importance in such disciplines as archaeology, anthropology, and art history. This book is the first treatment of the subject to analyse it from the perspective of aesthetics. Divided into three parts - The role of aesthetics in rock art research, Aesthetic appreciation of rock art: constitutive factors, and Case studies: opportunities and tensions in cross-cultural appreciation - the book is a collection of 16 essays by leading authorities in aesthetics and rock art. It includes contributions from Peter Lamarque on Palaeolithic cave painting: a test case for trans-cultural aesthetics, John Coles on Illuminations and reflections: looking at Scandinavian rock carvings, Howard Morphy on Aesthetics across time and place: an anthropological perspective on archaeology, and Sven Ouzman on Seeing is deceiving: rock art and the non-visual. These essays illustrate how an approach stemming from aesthetics adds to the understanding of rock art and also show how a focus on rock art can contribute to new perspectives in aesthetics'...this book certainly succeeds in its desire to make us rethink how we see and analyse rock art.' Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 'These wonderful insightful papers should encourage others to look at rock art not only as material for research projects, but as aesthetically appreciable manifestations of people from other places and times with whom, despite many differences, we nevertheless share a common set of joys, hopes, fears and fates.' Sir ReadAlot