First Contact Drawings

8/13/2019 First Contact Drawings

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First

ContactDrawings

Little Mind Pamphlet 4


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Email suggestions for future editions of First ContactDrawings to:

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Sources, doodles and asemia can be found at:

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Utrecht, February 200


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First Contact Drawings

The Crystalpunk rule of thumb is: thedevelopment of a human child into an imagemaker, from scribbling to representation,

recapitulates the growth of the imagemakingfaculty in the hominid mind! This opens up the"uestion, what did drawing look like before it

had firmly established itself# $y bringing

together evidence from archaeology,anthropology and psychology First Contact

Drawings shows the connections that bind thefirst drawing of the genus, the species and the

individual!


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The common e%perience of seeing faces where there are noneshows the insistence of our brain to create meaning if it cannotfind some! The & million year old 'akapansgat cobble, its (face(

shaped by nature, was transported over great distances by

)ustralopithecus africanus, or other hominids, presumably forthe hypnoti*ing power of its staring eyes! +ecognition of images

preceded, or perhaps spawned, the creation of images!


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The first (firstcontact drawing( may well predate the human linebut the trail of evidence begins with these engraved corte%es,

appro%imately --!--- years old! There is little doubt that these

were made by humans .almost/ like us!


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Finger Flutings, trac0s digitau%, finger tracings, meanders,macaroni, or serpentines are created by moving fingers through a

soft surface! They are found at nearly every rock art site in theworld! Their function and intent remains an open "uestion!


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This musko% drawing in )ltamira .&-!--- year old/ has beensuggested as the oldest known e%ample of an image discovered

in, or, liberated from, a fluting!


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1ainted and incised che"uered pattern in 2ascau%, 3,--- to4,--- years old! The oldest known independent abstract form!


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5ncised scriptlike signs found in 6ugoslavia and western

+omania on artefacts appro%imately 7--- years old ! 8nee%ample of marks somewhere between image and writing!


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)ustralian aboriginal people while talking draw on the sand,smoothing it over when they(ve finished a story! The sand talk

may recount places along a 9ourney, draw maps, or describe themovement of characters in a story! Evidence by analogy about

the function of fluting!


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5n the beginning is the scribble! The development of drawing in

children pass through a se"uence of steps! Children do not makepictures, they en9oy moving their hands and following the trail of

their movements!


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) ta%onomy of scribbles found in children(s drawings compiled by+hoda ellog!


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Entoptic phenomena, visual effects originating within the eyeitself, have been claimed to be the impetus behind image making!

The elegance of this theory is that it e%plains the occurrence ofform constants found in art since prehistory as a result of the

anti"uity of the nervous system! !


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;adia, severely retarded, had by the age of si% still failed to

develop any spoken language! $ut already in her third year she

had begun to show an e%traordinary drawing ability! 8ne famousstudy uses ;adia(s condition as an analogous e%planation for the

emergence of neolithic rock art!


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S!D! was a man born in


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>emineglect is a condition in which patients fail to be aware of

items to one side of space! Their drawings may fail to includeitems towards the neglected side, for e%ample when placing the

numbers in a drawing of a clock!


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These are representational drawings of a person by ?yearold6a"ui children from the valley and foothills of Sonora, 'e%ico!

The valley children have been e%posed to pesticide!


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) cat and a tapir drawn by members of the )ma*onian 1irah@

tribe new to pen and paper!


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) Danish e%plorer introduced Areenland hunter and shaman)9ukuto" to pencil and paper! )9ukuto" immediately started

drawing lines! >e said they were a womanBs thoughts and a dogBs

thoughts!


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The )ma*onian Caduvoe had no problem at all when drawingtheir elaborate body paint motives on paper, something which

they had never seen before!


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The adiw0u used insignia or property marks, printed in fire orpainted in their ob9ects and animals, especially in cattle! )t some

point, these marks were combined to form a protoalphabet!


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Signatures inscribed by the 'aori Chiefs in ;ew ealand on theTreaty of aitangi made with the English in ?-!


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E%perimental work with pigment uncovered from French;eanderthal sites has given substance to the idea that the

;eanderthal had bodypaint =-!--- to ?-!--- years ago! 5t isuncertain if ;eanderthal art, if any, was an independent

invention or borrowed from >omo sapiens!


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Elephants have long been known to draw with sticks and strawsin the sand of their enclosures! hen presented with pen and

paper they can work out for how to use them to draw! This is ascribble by 5ndian elephant Siri!


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1rimates of all sorts have been given access to drawing materials!Some people working with apes have claimed that apes are

capable of representational drawing but conclusive proof for thisin not available! )s a genre ape art has long gone beyond first

contact!


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First Contact Drawings

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