Periods of primitive art. Emergence and early forms of art

Art of the era of primitive society. Its oldest monuments known to science have been found in Western Europe (mainly in France and Spain).

They date from the same Late Paleolithic period as the appearance of modern humans (around 33 millennium BC).

Initially not isolated into a special type of activity and associated with the labor process, hunting magic, etc., primitive art consolidated the collective life experience of the community, reflecting a person’s gradual knowledge of reality, the addition of his first ideas about the world around him.

The image was an indispensable means of fixing, modeling and transferring from generation to generation a syncretic indivisible complex of spiritual culture, which included many future independent forms and types of human activity.

The emergence of art meant a huge step forward in the development of mankind, contributed to the strengthening of social ties within the primitive community, the formation of the spiritual world of man, his initial aesthetic ideas. Closely associated with primitive mythological views, it was based on animism (endowing natural phenomena with human qualities) and totemism, closely related to it (the cult of the animal - the progenitor of the genus).

A characteristic feature of Paleolithic art, which embodied its ideas in living, personified images, is bright, elemental realism.

The striking vitality of many Paleolithic images is due to the peculiarities of the labor practice and worldview of the Paleolithic man, because the life of a primitive hunter directly depended on the knowledge of animals and their habits.

The first works of primitive visual art appeared in the mature stage of the Aurignacian era (approximately 33-18 thousand BC). Since that time, in large spaces from Siberia to Western Europe, female figurines made of stone and bone with hypertrophied body shapes and schematized heads - the so-called Venus, apparently associated with the cult of the mother ancestress - have been widely distributed. Similar "Venuses" were found in Löspug (France), Savignano (Italy), Willendorf (Austria), Dolny Vestonice (Czech Republic), p. Kostenki near Voronezh.

At the same time, generalized expressive images of animals appear (statues made of stone, bone and clay: engraved figures or heads on bone, stone, horn), recreating the characteristic features of a mammoth, elephant, horse, deer, etc.

The first wall cave images (relief, engraved and pictorial) belong to the Aurignacian era, most often reproducing the head or front part of the body of the beast with roughly generalized lines.

Rock paintings, including cave paintings of the Paleolithic era, flourish in the Solutrean and Magdalenian times (20-11 thousand BC) - mainly in the south of France (paintings in the caves of Montignac, Niot, Lascaux, "Three Brothers "etc.) and the North-West of Spain (the paintings of the Altamira cave near Santander, etc.), but are also found in Italy (in the district of Rome, in the Otranto region and in Palermo), as well as in the Urals (the so-called Kapova cave on the river Belaya in Bashkiria).

The main motifs of the images, often covering vast planes, are individual figures of large animals full of life and movement that were the objects of hunting (bisons, mammoths, horses, deer, predatory animals).

Less common are schematic representations of people and creatures that combine the signs of a person and an animal, conventional signs, partially deciphered as reproductions of dwellings or hunting traps.

The technique of cave painting has improved over time. Precise, light contours of the line begin to play a subordinate role, boldly and accurately placed generalized color spots, applied with ocher, red, brown, black and yellow mineral paints, come to the fore. The subtle and soft gradation of tones, the imposition of one paint on another sometimes create the impression of volume, a feeling of the texture of the skin of an animal.

For all its vital expressiveness and realistic generalization, Paleolithic art remains intuitive and spontaneous. It consists of separate concrete images, there is no background in it, there is no composition in the modern sense of the word.

Architecture develops in the Late Paleolithic.

Paleolithic dwellings, apparently, were low, dome-shaped structures (rounded or rectangular in plan), deepened into the ground by about a third, sometimes with long tunnel-like entrances.

The bones of large animals were sometimes used as building material.

Numerous Paleolithic sites have been found in many parts of Europe and Asia, including in the territory of the former USSR (in the Ukraine and Belarus, in the Caucasus and the Don, in Siberia, etc.).

The culture of the Mesolithic (the transitional period from the Paleolithic to the Neolithic; from about 10 - 8th millennium BC) reflects significant environmental changes (the end of the ice age) that influenced many aspects of the life of primitive man: the spread of camps in the open, intensive the development of fishing and hunting, the creation of new tools, the invention of the bow, the beginning of the domestication of animals, the transition to more active productive activity.

Mesolithic rock carvings (discovered in Eastern Spain) differ sharply from Paleolithic ones.

An important place in them is occupied by the image of a person in action, multi-figure compositions: scenes of battles, hunting, etc.

There are several stylistic groups of images. The first, which, in particular, includes drawings from Addora (Sicily), is distinguished by relative realism.

Proportional and moderately detailed figures of people and animals are depicted in interaction. Groups of figures form clearly readable scenes. Then the images are stylized, becoming more and more conditional, and the figures of animals - to a lesser extent than human ones.

In the future, the tendency to generalization intensifies. The Mesolithic artist frees the human figure from details that interfere with the transfer of movement, action, complex angles, crowd scenes.

By the end of the Mesolithic period, conditional figurative images gradually give way to various signs and symbols.

In rock art (in Granada, in the Sierra Morena region in Spain), various conditional forms are found, similar in character to the signs found on pebbles.

Geometrization, schematism, which first appeared in the southern regions of Western Europe, spread to the north, up to Scandinavia.

The transition of primitive man from hunting to agriculture and cattle breeding (in those places where there were the most favorable conditions for this) caused significant changes in primitive art.

In the Neolithic era (from about the 8th-5th millennium BC) and the Bronze Age (about the 3rd-2nd millennium - the beginning of the 1st millennium BC), images appeared that conveyed more complex and abstract concepts, there has been a desire to create pictures of real life.

Many types of decorative and applied arts were formed (ceramics, metalworking, weaving; the art of ornament associated with them became widespread).

Initially, certain types of ornament had a magical, cult meaning, but as they developed, they also acquired purely artistic expressiveness.

At the same time, Neolithic images largely lost the vivid realistic immediacy of Paleolithic art and acquired conditional, stylized forms.

In the Neolithic era, the uneven social and cultural development of various regions of Asia, Africa, and Europe intensified.

The most mature forms of culture associated with the intensive development of agriculture and cattle breeding have developed in Asia Minor and Western Asia, as well as in northeast Africa.

Subsequently, the first class societies and slave-owning states arose here. Here already in the 3rd millennium BC. e. formed the main types of art - architecture, sculpture, painting.

The first monuments of art associated with agricultural cults appeared, apparently, in the 6-5th millennium BC. e. among the ancient tribes of Asia Minor and Mesopotamia.

The art of ceramics reached a high level here - vessels made of light clay with strict forms with elegant, laconic paintings made in red-brown colors.

The paintings include both geometric motifs, which probably have a symbolic meaning (stripes, wavy lines, triangles, rhombuses, mesh patterns, etc.), and light stylized images of birds and animals (mainly goats and rams).

Appeared here in the 6th millennium BC. e. female figurines made of clay, initially close to nature, and then with more schematic, generalized and elongated forms, as well as with a weighted lower body, were sometimes covered with geometric painting in the form of spirals, dots and strokes, probably imitating clothes.

The influence of the ancient artistic culture of Asia Minor and Mesopotamia in the 5th-3rd millennium BC. e. widely spread and originally refracted in the art of the surrounding areas, which also has local features (in North Africa, the Eastern Mediterranean, Southeast Europe, Central Asia, Afghanistan, Pakistan, etc.).

In more remote areas (for example, in the north of Europe and Asia, where the fishing and hunting primitive way of life was preserved for a long time) up to the 1st millennium BC. e. modified ancient forms of art have been preserved.

A large number of vitally convincing sculptural images have been found here (mainly the heads of elks, bears, waterfowl), most often forming part of cult wooden utensils and stone weapons (finds from the Oleneostrovsky burial ground in Karelia, 4th-3rd millennium BC, peat bogs Shigir and Gorbunovo in the Urals, 3-2 thousand BC; single finds in Finland, Sweden, etc.).

Small zoomorphic sculpture made of wood, flint, slate, and horn is also widespread. Here, picturesque, engraved or embossed with dot technique rock carvings were made (the so-called petroglyphs, or images carved on rocks, in Karelia, 3-2 thousand BC; petroglyphs and rock paintings in Sweden, the second half of the 2nd millennium BC. BC, and on the eastern slopes of the Urals, etc.).

Usually associated with tribal sanctuaries, on the territory of the former USSR they most often represent a whole gallery of simplified and schematic, naive and expressive images - images of animals, people, mythical creatures, solar and other undeciphered symbols, scenes of fishing and hunting. Rich complexes of rock carvings dating back to the Late Neolithic, Mesolithic and Bronze Ages have also been found in the Caucasus (in the Kobustan region), in Central Asia (in the Zaraut-Sai region in Uzbekistan), and also in West Africa (paintings of Tassilia Ajer in the Algerian Sahara). ). They make up sometimes complex, sometimes polychrome, vitally expressive multi-figure compositions, including figures of animals and people, scenes of everyday life, labor and hunting.

In medieval Europe, the transition to settled life and agriculture was accompanied by the rapid development of ceramics production, which underwent a complex evolution during the Neolithic and the Early Bronze Age and gave rise to many both local and pan-European cultural centers.

Simple, mostly rounded or straight-walled vessels were made by hand. In the south-east of Europe (the territory of Greece, Yugoslavia, Bulgaria, Romania, Moldova) and in Central Asia, multi-colored painted ceramics with a spiral pattern, an ornament of triangles or ribbons filled with dot inlay prevailed. The richness and variety of red-brown and black patterns in the form of spirals and curls, completely covering the vessels with white-yellow coating, distinguishes the Trypillia-Cucuteni culture, common in Romania, Western Ukraine and Moldova.

In the more northern regions (territories of modern Germany, Poland, the Czech Republic, the Netherlands, etc.), engraved, so-called linear-ribbon patterns in the form of curved stripes or spirals arranged in rows were common, and subsequently elegant vessels with embossed or stamped ornaments, folding from crosses, squares, stripes and other geometric motifs.

Found in the southeast and in the center of Europe, clay sculpture of this time (mainly schematically generalized female figurines, sometimes covered with a geometric painted or dotted through pattern) bears echoes of Mediterranean influences.

The architecture of the Neolithic and Early Bronze Ages is represented by communal settlements (multi-room houses of pillar construction or with a frame base of wicker rods coated with clay in Central and Eastern Europe; mud houses in Central Asia, etc.).

Numerous megalithic buildings made of large monolithic stone blocks testify to the progress of construction technology. They are found almost everywhere.

There are a complex of temples on the island of Malta with stone slabs covered with a relief spiral pattern, and the Stonehenge sanctuary (Great Britain), consisting of two rows of concentric stones, dolmen tombs in the Balkans, Asia Minor, the Caucasus, etc.

The discovery of metal production had a significant impact on the social development of primitive society.

In the Bronze Age, labor productivity increased, property differentiation and decomposition of the primitive community began. During this period, the Aegean art reached its peak, developing under the influence of Eastern civilizations and having a great influence on the formation of the culture of the Mediterranean, and especially Ancient Greece.

In Europe and Asia in the 1st millennium BC. e. the process of decomposition of the primitive community of people continued, tribal and ethnic associations gradually formed (ancient Germans, Illyrians, Celts, Normans, Saks, Sarmatians, Scythians, ancient Slavs, ancient Turks, ancient Finno-Ugric peoples, Thracians, Etruscans).

For this time in medieval Europe, modest dishes with a simple stamped geometric pattern, associated with the traditions of the Neolithic, bronze brooches, pendants, swords with geometrically ornamented hilts are typical.

The art of metal processing reached a high level here at the turn of the Bronze and Iron Ages.

Everywhere, the original cult and magical meaning of the images was supplanted by the decorative and ornamental principle.

From the middle of the 1st millennium BC. e. the art of the "barbarian" peoples of Europe and Central Asia perceived the growing influence of ancient civilization and later, with the process of the formation of feudalism, was included in the pan-European stream of development of medieval artistic culture.

However, rich and varied art, organically linked with the traditions of primitive art, continued to exist until the 19th-20th centuries. among peoples who have largely preserved primitive communal relations (among the natives of Australia, Oceania and South America, the Eskimos of Canada and North-Eastern Siberia, the peoples of Africa).

All-Russian State Tax Academy

ESSAY

ON CULTUROLOGY

on the topic

PRIMIAL ART

Completed by: group student NZ-103

Shchipitsina L.B.

Checked: ____________________

Moscow 2009

Plan

Introduction………………………………………………………………………3

Paleolithic. The art of the Paleolithic era…………………………………..4

Mesolithic. Mesolithic Art……………………………………..8

Neolithic. Neolithic Art………………………………………….11

Music and theater of primitive society……………………………….15

Conclusion………………………………………………………………...17

References………………………………………………………….18

Introduction

Primitive art, the art of the era of the primitive communal system. Primitive art arose around the 30th millennium BC. e., when a man of the modern type appears.

Primitive (or, in other words, primitive) art geographically covers all continents except Antarctica, and in time - the entire era of human existence.

The conversion of primitive people to a new type of activity for them - art - is one of the greatest events in the history of mankind. Primitive art reflected the first ideas of man about the world around him, thanks to him knowledge and skills were preserved and transferred, people communicated with each other. In the spiritual culture of the primitive world, art began to play the same universal role that a pointed stone played in labor activity.

By consolidating the results of labor experience in art, a person deepened and expanded his ideas about reality, enriched his spiritual world and rose more and more above nature. The emergence of art therefore meant a huge step forward in the cognitive activity of man. It helped to strengthen social ties and strengthen the primitive community. The immediate cause of the emergence of art was the real needs of everyday life.

In this work, I want to consider the different stages in the development of primitive art, starting from the late Paleolithic era.

Paleolithic. Art of the Paleolithic Age.

Paleolithic, Old Stone Age, the first of two major eras of the Stone Age. The Paleolithic is the era of the existence of fossil man, as well as fossil, now extinct animal species. People of the Paleolithic era used only chipped stone tools, not yet knowing how to grind them and make pottery - ceramics. They were engaged in hunting and gathering plant food. Fishing was just beginning to emerge, while agriculture and cattle breeding were not known.

The first works of primitive art were created about 30 thousand years ago, at the end of the Paleolithic era. These are primitive human figures, mostly female, carved from mammoth tusk or soft stone. Often their surface is dotted with depressions, which probably meant fur clothing.

In addition to the "clothed" figurines, there are nude female figures. These are the so-called "Venuses", associated with the cult of "ancestresses". On their thighs, a small belt like a loincloth can be discerned, and sometimes tattoos. The hairstyles of the figurines are interesting, sometimes quite complex and lush. They are still very far from a real resemblance to the human body. All of them have some common features: enlarged hips, abdomen and chest, lack of feet. Primitive sculptors were not even interested in facial features. Their task was not to reproduce a specific nature, but to create a certain generalized image of a woman-mother, a symbol of fertility and the keeper of the hearth. Male images in the Paleolithic era are very rare.

In addition to women, figures of animals carved from bone or stone were depicted: horses, goats, reindeer, etc. The first samples of artistic carving (engraving on bone and stone) date back to the same period.

The most important monuments of Paleolithic art are cave images, where full of life and movement figures of large animals that were the main objects of hunting (bison, horses, deer, mammoths, predatory animals, etc.) predominate. The first images of rock art are paintings in the cave of Altamira (Spain), dating back to about the 12th millennium BC. - were discovered in 1875, and by the beginning of the First World War in Spain and France, there were about 40 such "art galleries".

In the history of cave painting of the Paleolithic era, experts distinguish several periods. In ancient times (approximately from the 20th millennium BC), works of art were characterized by simplicity of forms and colors. Rock paintings are, as a rule, the contours of the figures of animals, made with bright paint - red, black or yellow, and occasionally - filled with round spots or completely painted over. Such "pictures" were clearly visible in the twilight of the caves, illuminated only by torches or the fire of a smoky fire.

Stone Age people gave an artistic appearance to everyday items - stone tools and clay vessels, although there was no practical need for this. Why did they do this? One can only speculate about this. One of the reasons for the emergence of art is considered to be the human need for beauty and the joy of creativity, the other is the beliefs of that time. Beautiful monuments of the Stone Age are associated with beliefs - painted with paints, as well as images engraved on stone, which covered the walls and ceilings of underground caves - cave paintings . People of that time believed in magic: they believed that with the help of paintings and other images, one could influence nature. It was believed, for example, that it was necessary to hit a drawn animal with an arrow or spear in order to ensure the success of a real hunt.

Later (from about the 18th to the 15th millennium BC), primitive masters began to pay more attention to detail. Ancient artists learned to convey the volume and shape of an object, applied paint of various thicknesses, and changed the saturation of tone.

The contour line has changed: it has become either brighter or darker, marking the light and shadow parts of the figure, skin folds and thick hair (for example, horse manes, massive buffalo manes). At first, the animals in the drawings looked motionless, but later the primitive man learned to convey movement. Figures of animals full of life appeared on the cave drawings: deer run in panic fear, horses rush in a "flying gallop" (the front legs are tucked in, the hind legs are thrown forward). The wild boar is terrifying in a rage: he jumps, baring his fangs and bristling. Cave paintings had a ritual purpose - when going hunting, a primitive man painted a mammoth, a wild boar or a horse, so that the hunt was successful and the prey was easy. This is confirmed by the characteristic imposition of some drawings on others, as well as their multiplicity.

In the XII millennium BC. e. cave art reached its peak. Painting of that time conveyed volume, perspective, colors, proportions of figures, movement. At the same time, huge picturesque “canvases” were created that covered the vaults of deep caves.

In 1868, in Spain, in the province of Santander, the Altamira Cave was discovered, the entrance to which had previously been covered with a landslide. Almost ten years later, the Spanish archaeologist Marcelino Sautuola, who was excavating in this cave, discovered primitive images on its walls and ceiling. Altamira was the first of many dozens of similar caves found later in France and Spain: La Moute, La Madeleine, Trois Frere, Font de Gome, and others. Now, thanks to targeted searches, about a hundred caves with images of primitive time are known in France alone.

An outstanding discovery was made quite by accident in September 1940. It so happened that it was the children, and quite by accident, who found the most interesting cave paintings in Europe. The Lascaux cave in France, which has become even more famous than Altamira, was discovered by four boys who, while playing, climbed into a hole that opened under the roots of a tree that had fallen after a storm. The painting of the Lascaux Cave - images of bulls, wild horses, reindeer, bison, rams, bears and other animals - is the most perfect work of art from those that were created by man in the Paleolithic era. The most spectacular are the images of horses, for example, small dark undersized steppe horses resembling ponies. Also of interest is the clear three-dimensional figure of a cow located above them, preparing to jump over a fence or a pit-trap. This cave has now been turned into a well-equipped museum.

In the cave of Montespan in France, archaeologists have found a statue of a clay bear with traces of spear blows. Probably, primitive people associated animals with their images: they believed that by “killing” them, they would ensure success in the upcoming hunt. In such finds, there is a connection between the most ancient religious beliefs and artistic activity.

Similar monuments are also known outside of Europe - in Asia, in North Africa.

The huge number of these murals and their high artistry are striking. At first, many experts doubted the authenticity of cave paintings: it seemed that primitive people could not be so skillful in painting, and the amazing preservation of the paintings suggested a fake.

The exact time of the creation of cave paintings has not yet been established. The most beautiful of them were created, according to scientists, about 20 - 10 thousand years ago. At that time, a thick layer of ice covered most of Europe; only the southern part of the mainland remained habitable. The glacier slowly receded, and behind it the primitive hunters moved north. It can be assumed that in the most difficult conditions of that time, all human strength went to the fight against hunger, cold and predatory animals. Nevertheless, he created magnificent paintings. Dozens of large animals are depicted on the walls of the caves, which they already knew how to hunt; among them there were also those that would be tamed by man - bulls, horses, reindeer and others. Cave paintings preserved the appearance of such animals that later completely died out: mammoths and cave bears. Primitive artists knew very well the animals on which the very existence of people depended. With a light and flexible line, they conveyed the poses and movements of the beast. Colorful chords - black, red, white, yellow - make a charming impression. Mineral dyes mixed with water, animal fat and plant sap made the color of the cave paintings especially bright. To create such great and perfect works then, as now, one had to learn. It is possible that the pebbles with images of animals scratched on them found in the caves were student works of the "art schools" of the Stone Age.

The striking vitality of many Paleolithic images of animals is due to the peculiarities of labor practice and the perception of the world of Paleolithic man. The accuracy and sharpness of his observations were determined by the everyday work experience of hunters, whose whole life and well-being depended on the knowledge of animals, on the ability to track them down. For all its vital expressiveness, the art of the Paleolithic was, however, to the full extent primitive, infantile. It did not know generalization, transmission of space, composition in our sense of the word. To a large extent, the basis of Paleolithic art was the reflection of nature in living, personified images of primitive mythology, the spiritualization of natural phenomena, endowing them with human qualities. The bulk of the monuments of Paleolithic art is associated with the primitive cult of fertility and hunting rites.

In the future, cave images lost their liveliness, volume; stylization (generalization and schematization of objects) intensified. In the last period, realistic images are completely absent. Paleolithic painting returned to where it started: on the walls of the caves appeared chaotic weaves of lines, rows of dots, vague schematic signs.

Along with cave paintings and drawings, various sculptures were made from bone and stone at that time. They were made with primitive tools, and this work required exceptional patience. The creation of statues, no doubt, was also associated with primitive beliefs.

In the late Paleolithic, the rudiments of architecture also take shape. Paleolithic dwellings appear to have been low, domed structures sunken about a third into the ground, sometimes with long tunnel-like entrances. The bones of large animals were sometimes used as building material.

Mesolithic. Mesolithic Art.

Mesolithic, the era of the Stone Age, transitional between the Paleolithic and Neolithic. The Mesolithic cultures of many territories are characterized by miniature stone tools - microliths. Chipped chopping tools made of stone were used - axes, adzes, picks, as well as tools made of bone and horn - spearheads, harpoons, fish hooks, points, picks, etc. Bows and arrows, various devices for fishing and hunting sea animals spread ( dugout boats, nets). Pottery appeared mainly during the transition from the Mesolithic to the Neolithic.

In the era of the Mesolithic, or the Middle Stone Age (XII-VIII millennium BC), the climatic conditions on the planet changed. Some of the hunted animals have disappeared; they were replaced by others. Fisheries began to develop. People created new types of tools, weapons (bows and arrows), tamed the dog. All these changes, of course, had an impact on the consciousness of primitive man, which was reflected in art.

The most striking examples of painting of the Middle Stone Age, or Mesolithic, are rock paintings on the eastern and southern coasts of the Iberian Peninsula, in Spain. They are located not in the dark, hard-to-reach depths of the caves, but in small rocky niches and grottoes. Currently, about 40 such places are known, including at least 70 separate groups of images.

These murals differ from the images characteristic of the Paleolithic. Large drawings, where animals are presented in full size, have been replaced by miniature ones: for example, the length of the rhinos depicted in the Minapida grotto is about 14 cm, and the height of human figures is only 5-10 cm on average. But the detail of the compositions and the number of characters are striking: sometimes it is hundreds of images of humans and animals. Human figures are very conditional, they are rather symbols that serve to depict mass scenes. The primitive artist freed the figures from everything, from his point of view, of secondary importance, which would interfere with the transfer and perception of complex poses, action, the very essence of what is happening. Man for him is, first of all, an embodied movement.

"Artists" used, as a rule, black or red paint. Sometimes they used both colors: for example, they painted over the upper body of a person red, the legs black. In addition to various shades of red paint, white was occasionally used, and egg white, blood, and possibly honey served as a stable binder.

A characteristic feature of rock art is a kind of transfer of individual parts of the human body. An exorbitantly long and narrow body, having the appearance of a straight or slightly curved rod; as if intercepted at the waist; legs are disproportionately massive, with convex calves; the head is large and round, with carefully reproduced details of the headdress.

Previously, the focus of the ancient "artist" were the animals he hunted, now - the figures of people depicted in rapid movement. If the cave Paleolithic drawings represented separate, unrelated figures, then in Mesolithic rock art, multi-figured compositions and scenes begin to prevail, which vividly reproduce various periods in the life of hunters of that time.

The people depicted on a light gray background of rocks are full of swift energy. Their nude figures are outlined with graceful clarity. The "artists" of this period achieved true mastery in group images. In this they are much superior to the cave "painters". In rock art, multi-figure compositions appear, mostly of a narrative nature: each drawing is truly a story in colors.

A masterpiece of rock art of the Mesolithic period can be called a drawing in the Gasulha Gorge (Spanish province of Castellón). On it are two red figures of shooters aiming at a mountain goat that jumps from above. The posture of people is very expressive: they stand, leaning on the knee of one leg, stretching back the other and bending their torso towards the animal.

A distinctive feature of the rock art of this period is that people occupy a central place in it. The team of hunters become the main characters of the artistic story.

Central to the rock art were hunting scenes, in which hunters and animals are linked in a vigorously unfolding action. Hunters follow the trail or chase the prey, sending a hail of arrows at it on the run, inflicting the last fatal blow, or fleeing from an angry wounded animal.

In lively and expressive images, we are faced with the life story of a primitive man of the Stone Age, told by himself in the rock paintings. Still, the main occupation of people was hunting for wild animals. The bow, the main invention of this period of the Stone Age, became the main weapon. In the foreground of the drawings, a hunter armed with a bow is always depicted. At the same time, people did not stop using throwing darts. Bundles of such darts, along with quivers full of arrows, can be seen in the hands of hunters and warriors. Dogs domesticated at that time also participated in the hunt.

There are drawings devoted to various methods of hunting: tracking, trapping, etc. Ancient "hunters" emphasized that hunting is a dangerous and difficult business. One of the drawings shows an angry bull, probably slightly wounded by arrows, chasing fleeing hunters.

Rock art allows you to imagine what a primitive man looked like. The men in the drawings are depicted, as a rule, naked. Only occasionally they wear short pants above the knees. With special care, fringes or cords are drawn at the waist and at the knees. Interesting variety of hairstyles for men; sometimes their heads are decorated with feathers stuck in their hair. Women wear long, bell-shaped skirts; breasts must be exposed. Images of women are rare: they are usually static and lifeless.

Rock art tells about the dramatic episodes of military clashes between the tribes. The drawings often depict battles: fierce fights, warriors fleeing from pursuit.

One of the large compositions in the Gasoulia Gorge surprisingly truthfully depicts the battle of ancient people. One group of warriors, armed with bows and arrows, pushes another: on the right - the attackers, on the left - the defenders. Attackers rush forward uncontrollably, showering their enemies with a cloud of arrows from tightly drawn bows. Among the defenders, one can see the wounded, struck by arrows, suffering from pain, but not surrendering to the enemy. In the foreground, a detachment of four shooters with desperate tenacity holds back the onslaught of the enemy.

In the canopy of the Mola Religia (Gasulya Gorge), an excellent drawing with a military dance scene has survived. Five naked warriors run one after another in a chain. Their bodies are equally tilted forward. Each holds in one hand a bunch of arrows, in the other - a bow, belligerently raised up.

Neolithic. Neolithic Art.

Neolithic, New Stone Age, the era of the later Stone Age, characterized by the use of exclusively flint, bone and stone tools (including those made using sawing, drilling and grinding techniques) and, as a rule, the widespread use of earthenware. Neolithic labor tools represent the final stage in the development of stone tools, which are then replaced by metal products that appear in increasing quantities. According to cultural and economic characteristics, Neolithic cultures fall into two groups:

farmers and pastoralists,

advanced hunters and fishermen.

The melting of glaciers in the Neolithic, or New Stone Age, set in motion peoples who began to populate new spaces. Intensified intertribal struggle for the possession of the most favorable hunting grounds, for the seizure of new lands. In the Neolithic era, man was threatened by the worst of dangers - another person. New settlements arose on islands in the bends of rivers, on small hills, that is, in places protected from a surprise attack.

Rock art in the Neolithic era becomes more and more schematic and conditional: images only slightly resemble a person or animal. This phenomenon is typical for different regions of the globe. These are, for example, rock paintings of deer, bears, whales and seals found in Norway, reaching eight meters in length. In addition to schematism, they are distinguished by careless execution. Along with stylized drawings of people and animals, there are various geometric shapes (circles, rectangles, rhombuses and spirals, etc.), images of weapons (axes and daggers) and vehicles (boats and ships). Reproduction of wildlife fades into the background.

Rock art has existed in all parts of the world, but nowhere has it been as widespread as in Africa. Carved, embossed and painted images have been found in vast areas - from Mauritania to Ethiopia and from Gibraltar to the Cape of Good Hope. Unlike European art, African rock art is not exclusively prehistoric. Its development can be traced approximately from the VIII-VI millennium BC. e. up to our days. The first rock carvings were discovered in 1847-1850. in North Africa and the Sahara Desert (Tassilin-Ajer, Tibesti, Fezzana, etc.)

During the period of the New Stone Age, cave painting fades into the background, giving way to sculpture - clay figurines. More or less mass production of the same type of products began, in particular sculptural images of animals and people, especially women. Archaeologists find them in a vast area: from the Mediterranean Sea to Lake Baikal.

The transition from hunting to farming and cattle breeding contributed to the development of new trends in art. Stronger than before, the decorative and ornamental trend developed already in the Paleolithic (decoration of household items, dwellings, clothes). In the Neolithic and Eneolithic epochs, and partly in the Bronze Age, among the ancient tribes of Egypt, India, the Near East, Asia Minor, and China, art spread, largely associated with agricultural mythology: painted ceramics with ornaments (in the Danube-Dnieper region in China - complex curvilinear , mainly spiral; in Central Asia, Iran, India, Mesopotamia, Palestine and Egypt - rectilinear geometric patterns, often combined with images of animals and stylized human figures).

The Stone Age was followed by the Bronze Age (it got its name from the then widespread alloy of metals - bronze). The Bronze Age began in Western Europe relatively late, about four thousand years ago. Bronze was much easier to work than stone and could be molded and polished. Therefore, in the Bronze Age, all kinds of household items were made, richly decorated with ornaments and of high artistic value. Ornamental decorations consisted mostly of circles, spirals, wavy lines and similar motifs. Particular attention was paid to jewelry - they were large in size and immediately caught the eye.

Along with decorative ornamentation, many agricultural tribes had a vitally expressive sculpture. The architecture of the Neolithic and Chalcolithic is represented by the architecture of communal settlements (multi-room mud houses of Central Asia and Mesopotamia, dwellings of the Trypillia culture with a frame base of twigs and adobe floors, etc.).

In the III-II millennium BC. e. original, huge structures made of stone blocks appeared, owing their appearance also to primitive beliefs - megaliths (from the Greek "megas" - "big" and "lithos" - "stone"). Megalithic structures include menhirs - vertically standing stones more than two meters high. On the Brittany Peninsula in France, the so-called fields stretched for miles. menhirs. In the language of the Celts, the later inhabitants of the peninsula, the name of these stone pillars several meters high means "long stone". Other structures have been preserved - dolmens - several stones dug into the ground, covered with a stone slab, which originally served for burials. The megaliths also include cromlechs - complex structures in the form of circular fences with a diameter of up to one hundred meters from huge boulders. Megaliths were widespread: they were found in Western Europe, North Africa, the Caucasus and other regions of the globe. In France alone, about four thousand have been found.

Numerous menhirs and dolmens were located in places that were considered sacred. Especially famous are the ruins of such a sanctuary - a cromlech in England near the city of Salisbury - the so-called. stonehenge(II millennium BC) . Stonehenge is built from one hundred and twenty boulders weighing up to seven tons each, and thirty meters in diameter. It is curious that the Stopped Mountains in South Wales, from where, as it was supposed, the building material for this structure was delivered, are located two hundred and eighty kilometers from Stonehenge. However, modern geologists believe that the boulders came to the vicinity of Stonehenge with glaciers from different places. It is assumed that they worshiped the sun.

The tribes that preserved the fishing and hunting way of life (forest hunters and fishermen of Northern Europe and Asia, from Norway and Karelia to the West to Kolyma to the East) had both ancient motifs and realistic art forms inherited from the Paleolithic. Such are rock carvings, animal figurines made of clay, wood and horn (for example, finds in the Gorbunovsky peat bog and the Oleneostrovsky burial ground). Rock paintings of the Neolithic and Late Bronze Ages were also created in Central Asia (Zaraut-Sai) and the Caucasus (Kobustan). In the steppes of Eastern Europe and Asia, pastoral tribes created the so-called animal style at the end of the Bronze Age and the beginning of the Iron Age. Cultural ties with Ancient Greece, the countries of the Ancient East and China contributed to the emergence of new plots, images and visual means in the artistic culture of the tribes of Southern Eurasia. The later stages of primitive art were associated with the growth of productive forces, the development of the division of labor during the period of the beginning of the decomposition of the primitive communal standing and the beginning of the formation of a class society. Rich and varied art, organically connected with the forms of primitive art, continued to exist until the 19th - 20th centuries. among peoples who have largely preserved primitive communal relations (the natives of Australia, Oceania and South America, the peoples of Africa).

The art of the Stone Age was of great positive significance for the history of ancient mankind. Fixing his life experience and attitude in visible images, primitive man deepened and expanded his ideas about reality, enriched his spiritual world.

Music and theater of primitive society.

It is difficult for us to imagine the music of primitive people. After all, there was no written language then, and no one knew how to write down either the words of the songs or their music. We can get the most general idea of ​​this music partly from the preserved traces of the life of people of those distant times (for example, from rock and cave paintings), and partly from observations of the life of some modern peoples who have preserved the primitive way of life. So we learn that even at the dawn of human society, music played an important role in people's lives.

Mothers, singing, rocked the children; warriors inspired themselves before the battle and frightened the enemies with warlike songs - cries; the shepherds gathered their flocks with drawling words; and when people gathered together for some work, measured shouts helped them to unite their efforts and more easily cope with the work. When someone from the primitive community died, his relatives expressed their grief in songs of lamentation. This is how the oldest forms of musical art arose: lullabies, military, shepherd, labor songs, funeral laments. These ancient forms continued to develop and survived even today, although, of course, they have changed a lot. After all, the art of music is constantly evolving, just like human society itself, reflecting the whole variety of feelings and thoughts of a person, his attitude to the surrounding life. This is the main feature of real art.

Music was included in the games of primitive people as an indispensable component. She was inseparable from the words of the songs, from the movements, from the dance. In the games of primitive people, the beginnings of various types of art were merged into one whole - poetry, music, dance, theatrical action, which subsequently became isolated and began to develop independently. Such an undivided (syncretic) art, more like a game, has survived to this day among tribes living in a primitive communal system.

In ancient music there was a lot of imitation of the sounds of the surrounding life. Gradually, people learned to select musical sounds from a huge number of sounds and noises, learned to be aware of their relationship in height and duration, their connection with each other.

Rhythm was developed earlier than other musical elements in primitive musical art. And there is nothing surprising here, because rhythm is inherent in the very nature of man. Primitive music helped people find rhythm in their work. Melodically monotonous and simple, this music was at the same time surprisingly complex and rhythmically varied. The singers emphasized the rhythm by clapping their hands or stomping: this is the most ancient form of singing with accompaniment.

In primitive society, man was completely dependent on the forces of nature that he did not understand. The change of seasons, unexpected cold, fires, loss of livestock, crop failure, disease - everything was attributed to supernatural forces that had to be propitiated to win over. According to the ancients, magic (magic) was considered one of the most important means of achieving success in any business. It consisted in the fact that before any labor process a mimic scene was played, depicting the successful implementation of this process. This is how ritual games were born.

The participants in the ritual games used a rather complex pantomime, accompanying it with songs, music, and dances. It seemed to the ancients that all this had magical powers. So already in the early ritual performances, some elements of modern theater were contained and merged together. Ritual games are always associated with the forms of economy that are developed among one or another people. The tribes, who obtained their food by hunting and fishing, played out whole hunting performances. The participants were divided into two groups. Those who portrayed "prey" decorated themselves with bird feathers, fangs, put on animal skins, animal masks, or painted the body and face. The game consisted of scenes of tracking, chasing and killing prey. Then all the participants danced to the sound of a tambourine or drum, accompanied by warlike cries and singing.

Among the agricultural peoples, mimic games were included in the holidays associated with the spring - with the revival of nature, with the beginning of sowing work, in the fall - with the harvest, the fading of nature. Therefore, most agricultural rituals depict the "birth" and "dying" of the deity - the patron of nature, the triumph of the light forces of life over the dark forces of death. On these holidays, mourning and sadness were replaced by joy, fun, jokes. Some features of such games were preserved in later Western European carnivals.

Conclusion.

The history of primitive art includes the problem of the origin of art and considers the stages of its development over several tens of millennia from the most ancient works of art of the Paleolithic era. In other words, this is the history of the pre-class period in the development of art. Once upon a time, what we call artistic creativity was not yet an independent type of professional labor activity. Unlike the art of the era of civilization, primitive art does not constitute an autonomous area in the sphere of culture. In a primitive society, artistic activity is closely intertwined with all existing forms of culture: mythology, religion. With them, it exists in indissoluble unity, forming what is called a primitive cultural complex.

In primitive society, almost all types of spiritual activity are associated with art and express themselves through art. At this stage of development, art is the same multi-valued tool of spiritual culture, which was a sharpened stone for the labor activity of primitive man - a universal tool used in all cases of his life.

In primitive art, the first ideas about the surrounding world are developed. They contribute to the consolidation and transfer of primary knowledge and skills, are a means of communication between people. Labor, which transforms the material world, has become a means of purposeful struggle of man with primordial nature. Art, which streamlines the system of ideas about the surrounding world, regulates and directs social and mental processes, served as a means of combating chaos in man himself and in human society.

The moment a person turns to this new type of activity, which we can conditionally call artistic creativity, can be considered as the greatest discovery, perhaps unparalleled in history in terms of the possibilities that it contains.

Bibliography

1. Alekseev V. P., Pershits A. I. History of primitive society. M., 1999.

2. Great Soviet encyclopedia. In 30 volumes / Ed. A. M. Prokhorova. 3rd ed. M., 1970-1978.

T. 16. Moesia - Morshansk. M., 1974. S. 8.

T. 17. Morshin - Nikish. M., 1974. S. 472.

T. 19. Otomi - Plaster. M., 1975. S. 355.

3. Mirimanov V. B. Primitive and traditional art. M., 1973.

4. Tylor E. B. Primitive culture. M., 1989.

1. primeval art (3)

   Abstract >> History

   Primary silhouette. Examples of the first works primeval art are schematic contour drawings of animals ... . Breil A. West - the birthplace of the great rock art // primeval art. - Novosibirsk, 1971. Bednarik R. Data interpretation...

2. Primitive culture as a historical type

   Abstract >> Culture and art

   Totemism, animism, magic) 3.1 primeval art primeval art – art era primeval society. It originated in the late Paleolithic... intact primitive Lifestyle. primeval art- only part primeval culture where...

3. Features of formation and development primeval art

   Abstract >> Culture and art

   26. Features of formation and development primeval art Peculiarities primeval

primitive art

primitive art- this is a modern, long-rooted name for various types of fine art that appeared in the Stone Age and lasted about 500 thousand years. In the Paleolithic - the ancient Stone Age, it was represented by primitive music, dances, songs and rituals, as well as geoglyphs - images on the surface of the earth, dendrographs - images on the bark of trees and images on animal skins, various body decorations using colored pigments and all kinds of natural items, such as beads, are popular at the present time. But all of the above is not able to withstand the onslaught of destructive time. Therefore, only abstract signs were preserved and gradually discovered, artificially carved on superhard rock surfaces in Central India, northern Australia and Peru, as well as animalistic cave painting, zoomorphic and anthropomorphic sculpture of small forms made of bone and stone, engravings and bas-reliefs on bones, stone tiles and horn, the Upper Paleolithic time (35.000 - 30.000 thousand years) and numerous accumulations of rock carvings on the surfaces of rocks in the open, the Neolithic era, or the new Stone Age, (11.000 thousand years), known to all inhabited continents. The Neolithic also includes the ruins of various megalithic structures in Europe, South America and Asia (for example: Stonehenge in Salisbury, with vertically mounted stones in a circle - cromlechs, weighing up to 50 tons, Great Britain, ordered rows of large uncut obelisk stones, on an endless Karnak field, called menhirs, and grave complexes from unprocessed large stones, for example, the Korkonn dolmen, Morbigan, France).

The first of the works of primitive art discovered during excavations were magnificent, realistic, engraved images of animals on the surfaces of bones, long-extinct animals of the Pleistocene era (2.2 million years - 11,000 thousand years) and hundreds of tiny beads made from natural materials (petrified calcite sponges) , found by Boucher de Perth, for the first time, in the 30s of the XIX century in France. But then, these findings turned out to be the subject of a fierce dispute between the first amateur researchers and dogmatic creationists represented by clergy, confident in the divine origin of the world. As a result, amazing, unusual finds did not inspire confidence both among professional scientists of the French Academy of Sciences and among the general public. The revolution in the views on primitive art was made by the discovery of Paleolithic cave painting. In 1879, Maria, the eight-year-old daughter of the Spanish amateur archaeologist M. de Sautuol, discovered on the vaults of the Altamira cave, in northern Spain, a cluster of large, from one to two meters, images of bison, painted with red ocher in various, complex poses. These were the first, officially published in 1880, Paleolithic paintings discovered in the cave. Currently, about forty caves with Paleolithic paintings are known in Australia, South Africa, Russia, Spain and France. The skill of ancient artists was reflected in the ability to convey the dynamics and characteristic features of animals through visual means. The first message about this, in Russian, appeared only in 1912, in a translation from French of the sixth edition of the course of public lectures by Solomon Reinac, read by him at the Louvre School in Paris in 1902-1903. At present, researchers from two international organizations ICOMOS (ICOMOS) - uniting professional researchers and IFRAO (IFRAO), an association of amateur researchers, which already includes 50 national organizations from all over the world, are studying primitive fine art.

primitive sculpture

rock painting

A bison attacks a man.

Rock paintings were made in the Paleolithic, in caves. The material for creating images was [paint] from organic dyes (plants, blood) and charcoal (the scene of the battle of rhinos in the Chauvet cave - 32,000 thousand years). As a rule, cave paintings and charcoal drawings were carried out taking into account [[volume, perspective, color of the rocky surface and the proportion of figures, taking into account the transmission of the movements of the depicted animals. The rock paintings also depicted scenes of fights between animals and humans. All primitive painting, as part of primitive fine art, is a syncretic phenomenon and was presumably created in accordance with cults. Later, images of primitive fine art acquired the features of stylization. Many examples of cave paintings are UNESCO World Heritage Sites (UNESCO World Heritage Site).

Megalithic architecture

Types of megalithic structures

• menhir - a single vertically standing stone
• cromlech - a group of menhirs forming a circle or semicircle
• dolmen - a structure made of a huge stone, placed on several other stones
• taula - a stone structure in the shape of the letter "T"
• trilith - a structure made of a block of stone, installed on two vertically standing stones
• seid - including a building made of stone
• cairn - a stone mound with one or more rooms
• covered gallery
• boat-shaped grave

Purpose

The purpose of megaliths cannot always be established. For the most part, according to some scholars, they served for burials or were associated with a funeral cult. There are other opinions as well. Apparently, megaliths are communal structures with a socializing function. Their erection represented the most difficult task for primitive technology and required the unification of large masses of people. Some megalithic structures, such as the complex of over 3,000 stones at Carnac (Brittany) France, were important ceremonial centers associated with the cult of the dead. Other megalithic complexes have been used to determine the timing of astronomical events such as the solstice and equinox. In the area of ​​Nabta Playa in the Nubian desert, a megalithic structure was found that served for astronomical purposes. This building is 1000 years older than Stonehenge, which is also considered a kind of prehistoric observatory.

Houseware

Literature

• Formozov A.A. 1966. Monuments of primitive art on the territory of the USSR. M. 126 p.
• Frolov B.A. 1992 Primitive graphics of Europe. M., Science.
• Semyonov V.A. 2008. Primitive art. Stone Age. Bronze Age. New history of art. ABC-Classic. S-Pb.
• Mirimanov V.B. 1997. Art and myth. The central image of the picture of the world. M., Consent.

Links

• Kravchenko A.I. Culturology: Textbook for universities.

Wikimedia Foundation. 2010 .

See what "Primitive Art" is in other dictionaries:

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Art of the era of primitive society. It arose in the Late Paleolithic ca. 33rd millennium BC e., reflecting the living conditions and views of primitive hunters (primitive dwellings, cave images of animals full of life and movement, female figurines). At… Big Encyclopedic Dictionary

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Rock art in the cave of Lascaux, France, approximately 14 thousand years BC. e., Upper Paleolithic Primitive society (also prehistoric society) period in the history of mankind before the invention of writing ... Wikipedia

A form of creativity, a way of spiritual self-realization of a person through sensually expressive means (sound, plasticity of the body, drawing, word, color, light, natural material, etc.). The peculiarity of the creative process in I. in its indivisibility ... Philosophical Encyclopedia

Art of primitive society; see Primitive art and also Stone Age, Bronze Age. Iron Age... Great Soviet Encyclopedia

The problem of the relationship between fine arts (I. and.) and mythology covers a wide range of issues related both to the genesis of I. and., and with the features of the language of I. and. and its ability to adequately convey the content of mythological texts, ... ... Encyclopedia of mythology

Books

• Primitive art. Artistic processing of hard and soft stone, Mikhail Prokopyevich Ermakov, The textbook, which is the first of its kind in the CIS countries and abroad, outlines the basics of primitive art and artistic stone carving. The evolution of stone processing technologies… Category: Jewelery Publisher:

FEDERAL AGENCY FOR EDUCATION

abstract

"Art of the Primitive Age"

Moscow 2009

Introduction

1. Paleolithic Art

2. Art of the Mesolithic and Neolithic

3. Art of the Bronze Age

4 Iron Age Art

Conclusion

Literature

Introduction

Primitive art is considered the art of primitiveness, i.e. from the appearance of Homo sapiens to the emergence of class societies. Primitive art covers many millennia: several periods of the late, or upper, Paleolithic (Old Stone Age, 35-10 thousand years BC), Mesolithic (Middle Stone Age, ca. 10-5 thousand years BC) .), the Neolithic (New Stone Age, ca. 5–3 thousand years BC), the Bronze Age (3–2 thousand years BC) and the Iron Age (1 thousand years BC). e.). The Paleolithic periods are named after archaeological sites. The epochs of human development in different places of the Earth do not coincide in time.

The term "primitive art" in no way means a simplified, low-level creativity. On the contrary, works created at the dawn of mankind cause amazement and admiration. During this period, all the main types of art arose: painting, graphics, sculpture, arts and crafts, architecture. Two main approaches to the image were clearly revealed: realism, following nature and conventionality, this or that transformation of nature in order to achieve certain goals.

The existence of primitive art was discovered quite recently, in the second half of the 19th century, when small sculptures, individual drawings on bone or stone, on the walls of caves began to be found. Monuments (works) of primitive art were discovered in various places on the globe, because by the end of the Paleolithic, all land on more or less habitable areas was inhabited by people.

The main occupations of primitive people were the gathering of plants suitable for food and the hunting of large animals - bison, woolly rhinoceros, mammoth, cave bear, wild horse, deer, wild boar. At the end of the Paleolithic, a person could already make various tools, build dwellings, and sew clothes using bone needles.

The improvement of material culture was consistent and gradual. In this regard, from the point of view of modernity, the Upper Paleolithic man was, of course, at a primitive stage of development, and the development of art was different - primitive people created works that today are considered great creations! Why did art appear so early and in such a mature form? What was the path of its initial development?

What we now call primitive art was born as part of a single human life activity, in which work and communication, knowledge of the surrounding world and self-knowledge, magical rites and artistic creativity were indissolubly combined. Primitive art was of a syncretic nature - art, mythology and religion were inseparable from one another. Artists in the modern sense, i.e. of course, there were no people involved in art as a profession. The images were created by the same hunters, although this was probably done by the most capable of artistic creativity.

The most important feature of primitive art is a special interest in the beast, which reflected the dependence of man on the world around him, on the forces of nature. Undoubtedly, the image of a person also occupied a certain place in it, and in recent periods it has in many cases acquired a leading position. However, in primitive art in general, the image of a person is not as important as in the art of subsequent eras, where a person will play a central role, and everything else will become only a background against which his activity unfolds.

1. Paleolithic Art

An amazing discovery was made in 1879 in the north of Spain in the cave of Altamira, the entrance to which had previously been filled up. Many color images of animals were found here.

The halls of the cave stretch for more than 280 m in length. The most famous of them is the Animal Hall. Images of living and dead bison, bulls, deer, wild horses and wild boars cover the walls and ceiling. In most cases, figures of animals up to 2.2 m in size are painted with ocher, charcoal on bare walls and vaults, and partially engraved. Brown and black colors contain diverse shades, in addition, ancient artists skillfully used natural relief ledges on the rocky surface, which enhanced the light and shade modeling of the form. The movements of animals, the texture of their fur are exceptionally accurately conveyed. Unfortunately, many of the images have darkened over time.

One of the drawings on the ceiling of the Altamira cave depicts a powerful figure of a bison. The drawing, which is about 20 thousand years old, is not only contour, but also three-dimensional. It is done with bold, confident strokes, combined with large splashes of paint. The buffalo is full of life, one can feel the trembling of its tensing muscles, the elasticity of short strong legs, one can feel the readiness of the beast to rush forward, bowing its head and putting out its horns. No, this cannot be called primitive painting. Such "realistic mastery" would be the envy of a modern animal painter.

Along with the figures of animals drawn and engraved in the rock, there are also very schematic drawings in Altamira that vaguely resemble human bodies.

The murals so impressed scientists that at first they were declared fake: no one could believe that such images were created by a primitive man. However, the discoveries of caves with paintings in different countries began to follow one after another, and all doubts disappeared. Usually the images were found in the damp and dark depths of the caves, where it is difficult to get there - you have to make your way through narrow corridors, through wells and cracks, often crawling, even swim through underground rivers and lakes. At present, about a hundred such caves have been discovered in France alone, the most famous of which is Lascaux.

On the territory of our country, the Kapova Cave in the Southern Urals is especially famous, in which in 1959 more than three dozen drawings of animals made in red paint were found, unfortunately, some of them are poorly preserved.

Murals and reliefs covered tens, hundreds of meters or even several kilometers of walls and vaults. The sizes of animal images range from 10 cm to several meters. For example, in the Kapova cave there are images of mammoths, horses, rhinos from 44 cm to 1.12 m; life-size bison are painted on the ceiling of Altamira, and in the Lascaux cave there are images of 4-6-meter bulls.

The places where the images were found were sanctuaries in which magical rites were performed related to hunting and the life of primitive communities. To influence the success of the hunt, people resorted to rituals. The primitive hunter believed that, by drawing animals, he, as it were, subordinated them to himself, and the pierced spear depicted by him killed the beast. Before the images, complex ritual actions were performed, in which elements of dance, singing, instrumental music, and pantomime were combined. At the same time, people painted their bodies in a certain way, put on masks, skins. All these rituals, in addition to magical ones, indirectly performed other functions: thanks to them, human thinking developed, knowledge, skills and abilities, including communication skills, were consolidated and transferred to new generations, emotional relaxation and training took place, and aesthetic needs were satisfied.

The drawings of the Upper Paleolithic era amaze not only with the skill and freedom of execution, but also with the understanding of animal behavior. Knowledge of the habits of animals for primitive hunters was a matter of life and death, the well-being and the very existence of the clan depended on this knowledge. Therefore, penetration into the life of animals, mental merging with them was an essential feature of the psychology of man of the Stone Age. In magical rites, these kind of first "theatrical performances", the beast was endowed with human traits and vice versa.

The animals were depicted in various poses, in motion: they walk, jump, fight, nibbling grass. Often their heads are turned back, as if hunters are chasing them. Primitive people were able to express in paintings, reliefs and engraved images associated with rituals, a certain state of the beast: fear, alertness, rage, threat, surprise, curiosity, calmness, peace. The drawing was executed not with one paint, but with several, it acquired volume, which was facilitated by tone transitions.

Often, a person saw a resemblance to the appearance of a particular animal in a ledge of a wall, in a stalactite, a fragment of a stone or a horn, and created an image on this basis.

Drawing this or that animal on the walls of the sanctuary, a person did not pay attention to the fact that many animals had already been painted there: it was important to fulfill his image, before which the hunters would perform a ritual ceremony. Therefore, the drawings were layered on top of each other, and often so thickly that almost nothing could be made out. Perhaps in such layering there was a deliberate intention to increase the number of conjured animals.

There were stories with animals wounded or killed on the hunt. For example, in the Lascaux cave, next to a bison pierced by a spear, a hunter is drawn, probably killed by this furious, mortally wounded animal. Man, unlike animals, is drawn very schematically. The face is depicted with a bird's beak, possibly a hunter's mask. Next to the man lies a spear-thrower, decorated with a figurine of a bird.

The magical rites of primitive man were aimed not only at the victory over the beast, but also at the reproduction of animals. This is probably why they often painted animals expecting offspring.

A special group is made up of images of strange creatures in which human features are combined with animal features - a deer, a bison, a mammoth, a goat, and various birds. It is possible that the monsters are people disguised as beasts, or invented symbols.

1879 - the discovery of the painting of the Spanish cave of Altamira by Marcelino Sautuollo.

Periodization:

1. Paleolithic(Old Stone Age)

lower middle upper

100-40 thousand BC - 10 thousand BC

Mesolithic (Middle Stone Age) - 10-8 thousand BC

Neolithic (New Stone Age) - 8 - 5 thousand BC.

Eneolithic (Copper Stone Age) -4-3 thousand BC

II. The era of Copper and Bronze - 2 thousand BC.

III. Age of iron - 1 thousand BC

On the edge Middle and Upper Paleolithic Homo Sapuens appeared, a variety of stone tools (points, sewn clothes), the exclusion of close relatives from family relations, the emergence of regular marriage, the formation of a family, tribal relations.

Upper Paleolithic- the emergence of speech, religion, art. Main occupations: hunting, gathering, hoe farming. Tools of labor: spears, darts, needles. The emergence of artificial housing. Sedentary lifestyle. Forms of primitive religion: totemism- belief in the supernatural family ties of people with any kind of animals, fish, insects; animism(spirit, soul) - belief in the existence of supernatural forces in the form of spirits; fetishism- the worship of inanimate objects, which were prescribed supernatural power. Magic- actions based on a person's belief in their ability to influence supernatural forces.

Neolithic upheaval: the emergence of agriculture and animal husbandry (cattle breeding), permanent settlements, the emergence of unions of tribes and nationalities.

General characteristics of the art of the primitive era:

- Syncretism(fusion, indivisibility), i.e. art was closely intertwined with all existing forms of culture and art: religion, mythology, etc. Thus, art exists in an indissoluble unity, forming the so-called. primitive syncretic cultural complex.

- conservatism- all artistic images are variations of a traditional theme that has been established for centuries.

- The role of the animal- the zoomorphic character of fine art, even in the anthropomorphic sculpture of Venus. The predominance of the image of the animal, because. it provided a person with food, clothing, all the interests of a person were connected with it.

In primitive art, the utilitarian preceded the aesthetic: to kill an animal, it was necessary to know its most vulnerable places, behavior, etc. At the beginning, a person learned to grasp and imprint the outlines and plastic forms of objects, and then to distinguish and reproduce colors.

The evolution of painting:

- human handprints

- linear pattern(macaroni) - wavy lines made by stroking along the contour or splashing paint that fills open areas.

A contour drawing in which the figures of animals, animal heads were guessed. The images are often not finished, the proportions are not respected, only the most important features of the body, head, and external signs of the subject were transmitted. The image was applied to the stone by carving or drawn on wet clay.

The most famous paintings of the Late Paleolithic were found at the end of the 19th century. in caves: France - Font de Gome, Lascaux, Montignac, Montespan, Nio, 3 brothers, etc.; Spain - Altamira Cave. Total at the end of the 20th century. more than 300 caves of primitive art were discovered: France - 150, Spain - 125, Italy - 21, Portugal -3, Russia - 2.

The body of the animal was depicted in profile, and the hooves and horns were depicted in full face or ¾. In contour planar painting, a transition to detail-hatching was gradually outlined.

- hatching- oblique strokes depicting animal hair.

In the future, the figures were completely painted over with paint, and the contour line began to play a subordinate role. Comes to the fore

- color spot, applied with earthen (ocher) paint (brown, yellow or black), which created the impression of volume.

Image of bulls, bison, horses 1.5 m in size using ledges and uneven walls of the cave. The image of bison in the Altamira cave: a steep ridge, all the bulges of the body are visible: muscles, elasticity of the legs; the feeling of the beast's readiness to jump, the eyes looking askance - this is no longer an elementary drawing, but the attitude towards the beast not only as prey - a source of food, but also admiration for him, respect as the patron of the family. However, primitive realism remains intuitively spontaneous, because consists of separate concrete images. It has no background, no composition in the modern sense of the word.

With the transition of man to complex forms of labor, in addition to hunting and fishing, the appearance of agriculture and cattle breeding, the invention of arrows and bows, earthenware, metal objects appear, changes occur in the art, in which

- image schematization and their narrative: attempts to convey the action, event (scenes of hunting, military operations). Iso is already one-color (black or white). Rock paintings in Spain, South Africa, Karelia (Russia) depict a man in action (battle scenes, multi-figured compositions). Then the images become more conventional, especially human figures.

By the end of the Mesolithic, by the Neolithic, conditional figurative images gradually give way to various signs and symbols, random interweaving of lines, dots, schematic signs - such images were called petroglyphs, those. stone inscriptions (on the rocks of Karelia, Uzbekistan, the shores of the White Sea, Lake Onega). Hunting scenes, etc. are narrated in a conditional form.

primitive sculpture:

Animal figurines are totems found in hunter settlements and carved from bone, horn or stone. Sculptures of women (5-10 cm) are the so-called. Venus associated with the cult of the mother ancestress, having magical significance, as indicated by the absence of a face image. Finds in Willendorf (Austria), Menton and Lespug (France), Savignino (Italy), the village of Kostenki (Voronezh region). Paleolithic Venus from Willendorf - swollen belly, bulky breasts - vessels of fertility, i.e. treating humans as if they were animals.

Dwellings: grottoes, caves, then settlements, parking lots, consisting of several dwellings: a recess 1/3 into the ground, without windows, doors, made of branches, skins, reeds, with a hole at the top. Dishes made of birch bark, coconut, pumpkin, clay, leather. Products were stored in wicker baskets coated with clay. So in the Mesolithic era, an ornament appears (lat. "decoration") as traces of weaving, smeared with clay. Subsequently, the ornament was artificially applied in order to give objects magical effects (these are parallel stripes, double spirals, schematized images of people and animals).

Architecture:

By the end of the existence of the primitive period, types of architectural structures appear, called cyclopean, in which the walls of the fortresses were made up of huge roughly hewn blocks - stones (France, Sardinia, the Balkan Peninsula, Transcaucasia). In addition to the cyclopean fortresses - defensive structures, the so-called. Megalithic buildings, i.e. built from large boulders:

- menhirs- vertically standing stones-pillars (idols). The oldest of them belongs to the Bronze Age (2 thousand BC), more than 20.5 m high.

- dolmens- the oldest burials - tombs, to which long corridors led. They were covered with earth (hill).

- cromlechs- the oldest Sanctuaries of the sun (Avebury and Stonehenge Great Britain, 2 thousand BC) The height of the "blue blocks" is up to 7 m, weight - 50 tons.

In the forest zone of Europe in the 2nd half. 1 thousand BC settlements were located - "fortifications", fortified with ramparts and log fences.