ANIMATION IN PALEOLITHIC CAVE PAINTING - THE FLICKER EFFECT:

8-legged bison, (see the black
and white diagram below),

Chauvet cave, France.

Photo electrummagazine.com,

Public Domain.

One aspect of cave art that has garnered considerable speculation is the existence of animal portrayals that are repeated, or that have elements that are repeated many times. Some researchers classify these as corrections, or purposeful changes to the animal image, others have speculated that these represent a number of other animals, behind and partially (or mostly) obscured by the animal in front. A proposition that is heard less often, but seems to be gaining more traction, is that they represent a form of animation, implying motion of the animal (or actually imparting the appearance of motion under the right lighting conditions).

Rhinoceros,

Chauvet cave, France.

Photo ctvnews.ca,

Public Domain.

Azema and Rivere (2012) addressed the question of imparting the illusion of motion. "In France, 53 figures in 12 caves represent movement using superimposition, shown by multiple images in the same place of the legs (31 cases), thus depicting rapid paces (trot or gallop), less often the tossing of the head (22 cases) and more rarely that of the tail (8 cases). Representation takes two forms: either by the addition of a second version, more or less complete, of the part of the body concerned, or by the multiplication of barely sketched contours (lines) around the head or legs, which generates a sort of dynamic flux. Lascaux is the cave with the greatest number of cases of split-action movement by superimposition of successive images. Some 20 animals, principally horses, have the head, legs or tail multiplied." (p. 318)

The lion panel.

Chauvet cave, France.

Photo cdn.history,

Public Domain.

This is an excellent description of the assumed intention of the Paleolithic artists, but I do not think that it goes nearly far enough. Picture, if you will, the animal images painted on the uneven surface of the cave wall, illuminated by the flickering light of a flame. Especially if the flame was moved side to side the different elements of the multiple view would be selectively illuminated (depending upon the position of the light and the angle of the portion of the wall), imparting the illusion of motion to the animal's image.

Horses, Chauvet cave, France.

Photo cdn.history,

Public Domain.

Examples from Chauvet Cave include the bison with multiple legs, the rhinoceros with multiple horns, the lion panel, and the multiple horse heads. The bison example and the rhinoceros example are pretty much self explanatory. With the lion panel you would have to see each of the lions across the lower part of the grouping in successive positions so the lion would appear to be lunging forward in four stages. Under the right lighting conditions the lion might open and close his mouth as well. The bison image's legs would be moving imparting the appearance of running, the rhinoceros moving his head, and lunging forward, and the horse raising his head, in other words - animation.

                    

The 8-legged bison in black and

white, Chauvet cave, France.

Photo wonderessive.com,

Public Domain

Azema and Rivere approach this proposition with the following statement: "An eight-legged bison drawn in the Alcove des Lions in Chauvet Cave proves that split action movement by superimposition was already used from the Aurignacian. This graphic illusion achieves its full impact when the light from a grease lamp or torch is moved along the length of the rock wall." (p. 319)

Now, I doubt that they were allowed to test this proposition with a grease lamp or torch in Chauvet Cave, so their statement, like mine, is only conjecture. But, at least, they did imagine some of the same effect I am describing.

If the motion of the light source were smooth, and the flickering of the torch at the right frequency, the effect could take advantage of the same neurological illusion that makes our motion pictures so effective - flicker fusion, sometimes called persistence of vision (Wikimedia). .

Of course, I cannot state with certainty that this happens, I do not have measurements of the various angles of the differing sections of wall that the multiple images are painted on (or even if there is more than one angle) so my conjecture above is just that - conjecture. It would be interesting to see this tested with some sort of strobe light under controlled conditions. Just imagine if . . . . . .

NOTE: 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 this you should read the original report listed below.

REFERENCES:

Azema, Marc, and Florent Rivere,

2012 Animation in Palaeolithic Art: A Pre-Echo of Cinema, Antiquity Publications Ltd., Antiquity 86 (2012):316-324, http://antiquity.ac.uk/ant/086/ant0860316.htm