Sunday, October 20, 2019

SIGN AND GESTURE IN ROCK ART - PART 1: IMPLIED.


There are many rock art enthusiasts who try to read written messages in the shapes and relationships of the elements of a pictograph or petroglyph. I have generally been a skeptic on this, I see no element of writing in North American rock art.


Australian Aboriginal rock art.
Internet, Public Domain.


Hawaiian rock art,
Photo. Paul and Joy Foster.

There is, however, one facet of this question that I have to confess might in some few cases have some validity. I am referring to portrayals of gestures that might have meaning in a sign-based system of communication. Carol Patterson has done some work with Australian Aboriginal and Hawaiian rock art where she found meanings in arm and leg positions which strike me as plausible.


We are accustomed to finding petroglyphs of Kachinas in the American southwest. Some of them can be identified by their markings and shapes. Severin Fowles (2013) points out that the identity of a kachina is also carried in his gestures and motions. "The Kachina dance, to be sure, involves masks and costumes that can be hung on walls and treated like art in a conventional sense, just as the overall choreography can be diagrammed and analyzed as a kind of finished product. It is quite clear, however, that the fluid series of gestural movements are themselves the source of the dance's potency. It is the dancer-in-motion - indeed, the community-in-motion that both makes and is made by the 'art'." (Fowles 2013:71) Perhaps this gesture and motion could also be portrayed by the position of parts of the image in a panel of rock art.

"Each is distinguished not only by the painting and decoration of his mask and body, but also by his songs, his dance step, his call, and his bearing. One moves across the plaza with long swaggering steps, another dances lightly from place to place, while a third moves with stately dignity." (Kennard 2002:4) In other words the identification of a Kachina would involve recognition of motion (gesture) as well as visual appearance. "These differences in dance steps serve to distinguish one Kachina from another; they become as essential characteristics as the painting and decoration of a mask." (Kennard 2002:12)

The viewer, recognizing the imagery of the mask and costume, associates the motions that go along with it mentally. In the vernacular of modern art this would be called "performance art", the image is only a remaining vestigial record of the gestures/performance that were the point in the first place.


Shalako, stars, shield, and dragonfly,
Galisteo Dike, Comanche Gap,
New Mexico, Photo. Peter Faris.


Close-up of the Shalako,
Galisteo Dike, Comanche Gap,
New Mexico, Photo. Peter Faris.

On November 11, 2009, I posted a column in RockArtBlog titled Kachinas In Rock Art - The Shalako. In it I wrote the following about these fascinating beings. "One very distinctive example is the Shalako. Although they are not technically Kachinas, the Shalako dance in pueblo ceremonials like the Kachinas. Resembling giant birds, the Zuni Shalakos are up to ten feet tall. While dancing rhythmically, they clack their beaks. They dance till near sunrise. The tall, conical and long-necked form of the Shalako with their long beaks was probably derived from the Sandhill crane."



Shalako, Albuquerque, New Mexico.
Photo. Peter Faris, 1988.

Rock art depictions of the Shalako can be dated back to the 14th century but its recent history is more complex. In her book Kachinas in the Pueblo World, Polly Schaafsma described the loss of much of the Kachina cult at Hopi. First through the efforts of the Spanish after their conquest of the southwest to eradicate native religions and supplant them with Christianity. This was conducted by the destruction of religious items and shrines, even religious leaders on occasion. Among Pueblo peoples this was manifested by burning Kachina masks, costumes and dolls, and outlawing the dances and ceremonies. Then in the nineteenth century Hopi was swept by smallpox epidemics which killed many of the elders who possessed the ceremonial knowledge necessary for the rites.

This was apparently the case with the Hopi Shalako. Its first recorded appearance at Hopi was in 1870 and its second was in 1893. At the 1893 reappearance a Hopi informant stated that their Shalako ceremony had not occurred for over 30 years. This Hopi Shalako was based on the Zuni Sio Shalako, but the ceremony was Hopi based upon reconstructions from memories. Schaafsma relates this story on pages 142 and 143 of her book Kachinas in the Pueblo World, University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque, 1994. She also related how the lost Hopi Shalako returned to Second Mesa through the efforts of the great Hopi painter Fred Kobotie who painted a reproduction based upon two tablitas he found in the basement of the New Mexico Museum of fine arts, and recognized them as belonging to the Hopi Shalako based on his memories of descriptions by his grandfather.


Zuni Shalako dance, 
Internet, Public Domain.


Shalako mask pictograph, Zuni,
Village of the Great Kivas,
New Mexico. Photo. Teresa Weedin.

Shalako depictions are found in rock art in the area of the Western Pueblos near both Hopi and Zuni, and are also found in the Rio Grande area. The examples shown here are petroglyphs of Shalakos from west of Albuquerque and from Galisteo dike east of the Rio Grande and south of Santa Fe, and a beautifully painted contemporary pictograph of Shalako from the panel of Kachina masks at the Village of the Great Kivas near Zuni." (Faris 2009)


Zuni Shalako, early 1900s,
p.138,Classic Hopi and Zuni
Kachina Figures, photo Andrea Portago,
Mus. of NM Press, Santa Fe.


Sia Salako, Zuni Shalako, p.102,
Hopi Indian Kachina Dolls,
by Oscar T. Branson, 1992.

The Shalako certainly have impressively distinctive shapes. "In the personization of these giants, the mask is fastened to a stick, which is carried aloft by a man concealed by blankets which are extended by hoops to form the body." (Fewkes 1985:66)

              
Shalako, Comanche Gap,
Galisteo Dike, New Mexico.
Photo. Peter Faris, 1988.

Seeing the motions of this giant, birdlike being, with its head gracefully bobbing and dipping high in the air, would be an unforgettable experience. And seeing the image (the petroglyph or pictograph) of this being inevitably recalls the accompanying sounds and motions. For me it always happened when my grandchildren watched big bird on Sesame Street.

NOTE: Some images in this posting were retrieved from the internet with a search for public domain photographs. If any of these images are not intended to be public domain, I apologize, and will happily provide the picture credits if the owner will contact me with them. For further information on these reports you should read the original reports at the sites listed below.

REFERENCES:

Faris, Peter
2009 Kachinas In Rock Art - The Shalako, November 11, 2009, https://rockartblog.blogspot.com

Fewkes, Jesse Walter
1985 Hopi Katcinas, Dover Publications, Inc., New York

Fowles, Severin, and Jimmy Arterberry
2013 Gesture and performance in Comanche Rock Art, pages 67-82, in World Art 2013, Routledge, Taylor and Francis Group, UK.

Kennard, Edward A.,
2002 Hopi Kachinas, Kiva Publishing, Walnut, CA.

Schaafsma, Polly
1994 Kachinas in the Pueblo World, University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque

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