Cave Drawing

Kim Dowdell

12/7/2013

Cave Drawing Paper

The wall painting with the bird-headed man, bison and rhinoceros was chosen for the purpose of completing this week’s homework assignment.  This historic cave drawing dates back to 15,000 BCE.  The actual tile given to this exceptional drawing is the “Bird-Headed Man with Bison.”  The assignment requested that an interpretation be given in terms of characteristics, visual elements and what type of revelations did the drawing give about the culture during this period in history.  When reviewing any type of art, there could possibly be many different interpretations about what an artist is trying to convey.  However, cave art seems to send strong messages about what was happening during a specific period in time.  In writing this paper, this author hopes to reveal her impressions of this spectacular cave drawing.

There is nothing like reviewing art and then feeling as if one has gone back in time and re-living what has been depicted.  First, one must be able to note what characteristics the artist used, which in this case were many.  Additionally, noted were the various lines throughout, which appear as stick figures, a small bird and the remaining lines seems as if they are directional.  This tells one that this may have something to do with the direction traveled during that time, or maybe it has something to do with the sun and time.  The artist could have possibly been tracking time in days or years.  The next characteristics noted was that the rhinoceros appeared larger and darker, which may have meant that this was a celebrated deity, and the man with the bird-like face and bison’s body may have represented another of their gods. (Sayre, 2013).  There were other bird drawings within this picture, and this author believes that the artist was conveying that the bison like man, and a rhinoceros were the strong leaders. The animals in between were protected by their leaders.  It is as if the drawing was stating we...