I have been interested in the human urge to depict the world around us at least since a visit to Lascaux caves in France in 1976. This huge instalation, made around 50,000 years ago, demonstrates (to me) an urge that Prof Dennis Dutton (a former Prof. Aesthetics from new Zealand) described very eloquently as an instinct with Pliestocene origins. From it he has traced a quite plausable evolutionary development to the present day.
I began exploring the ideas around this because I find the idea of irregularities in rock walls as seen in firelight leading to recognition of a the clues found in nature that are used by hunter gatherers to0 detect quarry species and danger very convincing. Much of this was reinforced by time spent in Tsavo National Park with a Masai bush guide.
This is a piece of work I did following through the exploration, for which I became the joint 2012 winner of the Sir Arnold Wolfendale Prize for Art in Science and Nature. It is created like a bas relief that can be fitted flush with a wall and which evokes the idea of a cave wall.
David J Coleman 