Talk:Cave painting

History of discovery section
Doesn't contain a single word about the history of any of these caves' discovery. That's odd. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 137.147.139.206 (talk) 11:19, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

Untitled
A new dating method just found the Spanish cave paintings to be over 40 000 years old - ten thousand years older than the French cave paintings: http://www.ajc.com/news/nation-world/spanish-cave-paintings-shown-1458067.html Can someone edit the article to reflect this?76.110.169.129 (talk) 07:15, 15 June 2012 (UTC)

Coa Valley in Portugal
I think the Coa Valley should be included in the European section. It is featured in the UNESCO World Heritage site (http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/866)

Ruimiguelvieira (talk) 09:27, 6 July 2011 (UTC)

cave painting with children
just saw this in the news sky news bbc with video lots of other hits on a google news search for cave painting at the moment. EdwardLane (talk) 17:13, 30 September 2011 (UTC)

Paint manufacture
Prehistoric paint manufacture NY times report here and a google search with a tack more articles here. EdwardLane (talk) 20:25, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

Expanding on this thought, shouldn't there be a brief overview in its own section of their manufacture? Currently most of it is under the section entitled "1.2 Subjects, themes and patterns". A new section would focus on the materials used to make the art (charcoal, pigment sources as mentioned, grinding, mixing and any heating of pigments, what colors they had to work with, etc.), where they get them from (nearby rocks, animals, etc.), and different methods of painting (finger fluting, brushes, any drying period needed, etc. -- this would include integrating both mentions on hand stencils in this page here) I realize finger fluting for instance has its own page, but a simple line about it seems in order. Skingski (talk) 00:16, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

File:20,000 Year Old Cave Paintings Hyena.gif Nominated for Deletion
The result was Keep EdwardLane (talk) 10:03, 15 June 2012 (UTC)

Verify source request for Guthrie
Requested verification for the following statement: "He hypothesizes that the main themes in the paintings and other artifacts (powerful beasts, risky hunting scenes and the representation of women in the Venus figurines) are the fantasies of adolescent males, who constituted a large part of the human population at the time."

Review of the excerpt in the link provided does not support the statement as is. Specifically, Guthrie states: "My main conclusion is that preserved Paleolithic art, unlike most 'tribal art,' is a graphic expression whose articulation we can largely comprehend, and that the perspective of natural history offers an essential dimension to that appreciation; it is the 'code-breaker.'"

This is quite different from blankly attributing the art to "the fantasies of adolescent males", although that's part of it. If the work elsewhere supports the claim in the article, a page number is needed. Else, the article should be reworded. Richigi (talk) 00:56, 31 December 2012 (UTC)

Painted "Venus" figures
This article claims (under the Themes and patterns section) that the Venus figurine has no equivalent in cave paintings. The Chauvet article, however, describes a partial Venus. While the occurrence admittedly seems rare, can it be discarded? Or is the Chauvet article stretching a point? There's no inline citation for either claim. Richigi (talk) 01:07, 31 December 2012 (UTC)

Gobustan National Park
I think the Gobustan National Park should be included in this article. It was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site considered to be of "outstanding universal value" for the quality and density of its rock art engravings in 2007. Shahin44 (talk) 05:03, 21 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Shahin44, the Gobustan site is important, but this article is about cave painting. I believe the Gobustan art is petroglyphs on boulders; it's mentioned in the petroglyph article. Richigi (talk) 02:04, 7 March 2013 (UTC)

Earliest cave paintings
My preference would be to identify Chauvet as the earliest cave paintings in the lead. Maybe we could specify "earliest figurative cave paintings." I understand that the El Castillo paintings are earlier, but when most people think of paintings, they think of the figurative art as at Chauvet, Lascaux, and Altamira. It seems like the "paintings" at El Castillo are more like scribbles. TimidGuy (talk) 10:20, 17 October 2013 (UTC)

Hand Stencils
Any support for a separate section or article for primitive hand stencils? Kortoso (talk) 17:53, 9 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Given the recent dating by Aubert at Maros in Sulawesi, I think there's a good case for a separate section, because of their significance. Except that the current arrangement here by geographic location is very neat. Martinevans123 (talk) 17:57, 9 October 2014 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure what you mean by "neat". Hand stencils appear to be mixed in with the other art. Kortoso (talk) 23:13, 9 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Sorry, I meant that the main bulk of the article is organised by geographic location, in a very logical way. But there is no reson why a new sub-section could not be added under "Themes and patterns". Martinevans123 (talk) 11:18, 10 October 2014 (UTC)
 * A paragraph in that section would be fine, and enough. There are many other sites where only they and small patterns appear. Johnbod (talk) 14:12, 10 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Good suggestion. We do need to add this discovery to the article and to change the lead. Unlike El Castillo, Maros has figurative art. Would be nice if we could still include Chauvet in the second sentence of the lead while adding Maros. TimidGuy (talk) 14:16, 10 October 2014 (UTC)


 * A decent site to cite: http://www.bradshawfoundation.com/hands/ Kortoso (talk) 16:37, 10 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Done that. Johnbod (talk) 18:09, 10 October 2014 (UTC)
 * We (and the press headlines) are not yet quite right here. I've added researcher quotes to the refs, but the text needs to reflect these properly:


 * Sulawesi: Ghosh, Pallab. "Cave paintings change ideas about the origin of art". BBC News. BBC News. "The minimum age for (the outline of the hand) is 39,900 years old, which makes it the oldest hand stencil in the world," said Dr Aubert. "Next to it is a pig that has a minimum age of 35,400 years old, and this is one of the oldest figurative depictions in the world, if not the oldest one," he told BBC News. There are also paintings in the caves that are around 27,000 years old, which means that the inhabitants were painting for at least 13,000 years."


 * Spain: Pike, A. W. G.; Hoffmann, D. L.; García-Diaz, M.; Pettitt, P. B.; Alcolea, J.; De Balbín, R.; González-Sainz, C.; de las Heras, C.; Lasheras, J. A.; Zilhão, J. (15 June 2012). Science 336 (6087). pp. 1409–1413. doi:10.1126/science.1219957. Abstract: "... minimum ages of 40.8 thousand years for a red disk, 37.3 thousand years for a hand stencil, and 35.6 thousand years for a claviform-like symbol".

So the Spanish red disk is still ahead by a nose, but Sulawesi has the oldest animal. Note these datings change all the time - both refs are from the last 2 years. Johnbod (talk) 18:09, 10 October 2014 (UTC)
 * I think sorted now. Johnbod (talk) 18:54, 10 October 2014 (UTC)
 * The article still calls them thus: ".. hand prints. About 1500 negative handprints.. " - should this say "hand stencil"? Thanks. Martinevans123 (talk) 19:01, 10 October 2014 (UTC)

Coliboaia Cave in Romania
I removed a statement from the lead placing these paintings among the earliest, along with Chauvet, because my understanding is that they haven't yet been dated. The only dating I could find in Google Scholar was a speculative statement by Clottes. And even that was very general. TimidGuy (talk) 10:16, 24 December 2014 (UTC)

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Article needs a rewrite
Based on these new important events ( http://science.sciencemag.org/content/359/6378/912 ) someone updated the article in the "Age" section, but the intro is still the old one. I think it needs a complete overhaul with the new info. 92.56.37.129 (talk) 20:05, 6 March 2018 (UTC)

This has more implications for Neanderthal behavior than for cave painting. The fact that we may have found a hand stencil made by Neanderthals does not change the bulk of information to be discussed under "cave art", as the article topic is not "which is the oldest dated cave art", but "give an overview of all notable traditions of cave art worldwide, from the Paleolithic to recent times". --dab (𒁳) 06:09, 30 August 2018 (UTC)

"right hand"?


a left hand looks just like the "right hand" stencil, when looking at its front. In the Cave_painting#East_and_Southeast_Asia section, I deleted "the stencils of right hands shown" for this reason. 2A01:E0A:1DC:4570:FD72:89DB:28C1:7C15 (talk) 04:43, 9 April 2024 (UTC)


 * Yes, that claim seems not to have been sourced. But what about these claims, under "South America":
 * Most of the hands are left hands, which suggests that painters held the spraying pipe with their right hand. Expert analysis must be able to determine which had was used? Thanks. Martinevans123 (talk) 08:25, 9 April 2024 (UTC)
 * unfortunately (or not) we have a policy to NOT discuss even obvious bullshit as long as it is published under university umbrella (assuming the provided reference actually says that, as quite often it doesn't, or with caveat; I even came across situation where the provided ref told the very opposite). It would require some opposing university reference, that I cannot provide.
 * But we can rephrase in a less affirmative tone 2A01:E0A:1DC:4570:FD72:89DB:28C1:7C15 2A01:E0A:1DC:4570:B10E:1AE6:E159:1BD7 (talk) 21:44, 10 April 2024 (UTC)

New oldest animal cave painting
New oldest animal cave painting found yesterday! Can't edit lately, so I'll do a source dump here.

https://www.cnn.com/2024/07/04/science/indonesia-oldest-narrative-cave-art-scn-intl-hnk/index.html

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/worlds-oldest-cave-painting-least-51200-years-old-scientists-say-rcna160304

https://www.theguardian.com/science/article/2024/jul/03/oldest-picture-story-cave-painting-indonesia-record-51000-years

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-024-07541-7

TheWikiToby (talk) 17:08, 4 July 2024 (UTC)