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00:00:00Whether we call it art or not, there's something absolutely wonderful, isn't there?
00:00:06Just about this activity as a form of thinking and feeling through, just doing, through making.
00:00:16I've been doing this for 40 years, just trying to make things that ask that question.
00:00:22What does it feel like to be alive now?
00:00:30For me, art is the best tool we have for trying to understand our place in the world.
00:00:37And I think that's what it's done since it began tens of thousands of years ago.
00:00:43I want to go back to the very beginning.
00:00:47To see the art of our ancestors.
00:00:50Wow!
00:00:52And understand what compelled them to create these images.
00:00:57This is so moving. I mean, so tender.
00:01:02Once we believed that art began with the cave paintings of Ice Age Europe.
00:01:08But now, new discoveries are overturning that idea.
00:01:13I'm going to travel across the world to piece together a new story of when and where art really began.
00:01:21It still strikes me as a complete miracle.
00:01:25And find out what it can tell us about who we are.
00:01:29Absolutely magnificent.
00:01:33If we can look closely at the art of our ancestors,
00:01:40perhaps we will be able to reconnect with something vital that we have lost.
00:01:4514,000 years ago, a small group of humans came to this valley.
00:02:05This is the Veserre in the south of France.
00:02:08It was here, during the last Ice Age, that modern humans created some of the most extraordinary works of art the world has ever seen.
00:02:21When I was a student, this was thought to be the place where art began.
00:02:27And this is where my own journey began almost 40 years ago.
00:02:31I came here with my wife on our honeymoon.
00:02:36We'd just graduated from art school.
00:02:39We had a Renault 4 van and a tent.
00:02:42And we went on a road trip together to see the beginnings of art.
00:02:53So much has changed since then for me.
00:02:55I want to start this journey by returning here, a tiny cave called Les Combarelles.
00:03:10The images in this cave were made between 14,000 and 16,000 years ago.
00:03:16They aren't the earliest we know of, but they are some of the most exciting to me.
00:03:20Because here, you can feel the raw creative process in action as images start to emerge in the torchlight.
00:03:35It's extraordinary to me to think that I was in this very cave 38 years ago.
00:03:40That feeling, that remembrance of going into something very secret and very sacred.
00:03:50Just imagine, so here is the original cave surface.
00:03:55I mean, the bottom, the surface of the bottom of the cave.
00:03:59So we're less than a meter between the top and the floor.
00:04:04So you're crawling, crawling on your hands and knees, just like the animals that you're going to now try to summon.
00:04:22We have a horse.
00:04:24Look at that.
00:04:25Look at that.
00:04:28It's almost smiling.
00:04:30This is incredible.
00:04:32And then look at the mane with all the hairs kind of standing up, like, to attention.
00:04:38And then those ears all folded forward.
00:04:40He's very aware, very alert.
00:04:43And then those veins and lines in the neck.
00:04:48This is fantastic.
00:04:49Using a sharpened piece of flint and scratching into the walls around them, these Ice Age artists conjured the essence of an animal.
00:05:06Phew!
00:05:08There's so much here.
00:05:13Just hardly a surface that hasn't been.
00:05:17Just a web.
00:05:19Look, look, look.
00:05:23Because it's fantastic.
00:05:25There's just so much energy in just the making of the lines, whether they found a form or not.
00:05:33And it's almost like they want to sort of express the energy they're feeling.
00:05:39Because there's marks everywhere on these walls.
00:05:44Look, just everywhere.
00:05:46There is the famous lion.
00:05:50But isn't that magnificent? Just that feeling of the profile of the head and then this forward, like, motion of the right leg as it moves, in a way, out of the inchoate, the unseen into visibility.
00:06:14I must say, I'm changing my mind about what we're looking at here.
00:06:30We can see that there are, yes, emergent figures, but actually it's the act of drawing itself that is the thing.
00:06:40And maybe something comes and maybe something comes and maybe it doesn't.
00:06:44Maybe it doesn't.
00:06:49You just feel like the energy of legs moving, legs moving through the grass.
00:06:54And we've seen legs now already of horses and then that last lion.
00:07:00And then, oh, look, look, look, look, this deer.
00:07:07Is it a reindeer?
00:07:08Is it a reindeer?
00:07:09Yes.
00:07:10Look, bending down to drink.
00:07:13Can you see that?
00:07:14Can you see that?
00:07:15There's the lovely curved antlers.
00:07:18And then you can see the brow above.
00:07:21And even, is that a tongue?
00:07:23Do you see just there?
00:07:25Tongue coming out from the lower lip.
00:07:29This is so gentle, isn't it?
00:07:34It's so empathic.
00:07:39You could spend all day here just dreaming with this wall.
00:07:43It's like you're, it's like you're reading, you know.
00:07:46These are marks left by humans, but they are part then of the rock.
00:07:50And it's like the rock now is a place where you can dream and bring forth these, yeah, these presences.
00:07:59It's just a, it's like this is a kind of, you know, cathedral of memory, but also joy in living things.
00:08:15But then, you know, things come and they go.
00:08:20These engravings were made between 14,000 and 16,000 years ago.
00:08:37Just think about what that means.
00:08:39This was the time before farming, before the invention of metal tools.
00:08:53And the people who made these were foragers, hunter-gatherers.
00:09:01But this cave shows us that making art was something vitally important to Ice Age people.
00:09:08Again and again they came here, scratching and marking over and over to leave traces that have lasted for millennia.
00:09:16And in a way I think I come out thinking how, how wide this need to leave an inscription and a trace is.
00:09:37All of those abstract ideas about time just totally cease to matter.
00:09:48There's a absolute presence, absolute presentness and absolute presence in there.
00:09:54And, er, that is art of now.
00:10:00I mean it's absolutely extraordinary how immediate it is.
00:10:06When cave paintings were first discovered in Europe, more than a century ago,
00:10:15an idea took hold that they must have somehow helped us to hunt and kill the animals that they represented.
00:10:22But that isn't what I see here.
00:10:25There is a cave further up the Veser valley called Fond de Gaume,
00:10:34which I think shows that Ice Age artists had a very different intention.
00:10:40This is one of the most touching images that we have.
00:11:00We already saw a reindeer drinking.
00:11:05Now we have a male and female in this incredibly intimate moment.
00:11:15The male standing above and painted in black,
00:11:20and the female this wonderful smudge of ochre.
00:11:27So, there is the eye.
00:11:30Here is the ridge.
00:11:31There is the eyebrow.
00:11:33Here is the nose.
00:11:34Here is the tongue.
00:11:36Here is the bottom of the head.
00:11:40And then there is the bottom of the neck.
00:11:43Here is the front leg.
00:11:45There is the back leg.
00:11:46And then these magnificent horns.
00:11:50And then here is the red deer.
00:11:57And you can see its head very closely.
00:12:00There is his eye.
00:12:01And it's painted and engraved, but very, very gently.
00:12:07The connection between the two is so gentle.
00:12:13This tongue just touching seemingly the horns of the female.
00:12:24The kind of conventional view is that cavemen were primitive
00:12:29and everything that they had to do with was to do with the hunt and killing.
00:12:34And it's so, through images like this and the one that we looked at earlier in Combareil,
00:12:43it's completely the opposite.
00:12:46You know, I think we just have to give up on the idea of the hairy caveman being a brute.
00:12:55This is so moving.
00:12:57I mean, so tender, so, yeah, peaceful.
00:13:03It seems to be about continuity.
00:13:10We had to live by killing.
00:13:17And yet we saw that in some way these animals show us our better selves.
00:13:33When we created the images in this valley, there were perhaps 50,000 humans in all of Europe.
00:13:47Far from being the dominant hunters, we were the vulnerable ones.
00:13:52If you could imagine that you were standing at the edge of a valley and you heard this sound.
00:14:07The sound of a million hooves beating on the earth.
00:14:14You would hear it before you see it and then this wave of animal life would appear.
00:14:24That rush, that feeling, that feeling of being surrounded by a plethora of life forms in which you were very small, utterly dependent.
00:14:40And they seem like the wind in the trees, the water of a river, to be closer to the heartbeat of the way things are.
00:14:53You would want to become, you would want to become, you would want to be filled with that energy, spirit.
00:15:00We've just seen, as it were, a monumental expression of extreme delicacy.
00:15:23This is art before narcissism.
00:15:26This is art dedicated to the fact that we are part of a continuum of life.
00:15:32We live in a time where we spend more time involved in our meta-language, through screens, through all the ways in which we, in a way, re-dramatize our little hopes and fears.
00:15:47Here is an unequivocal expression of how dependent we are on all living beings.
00:15:58But not all Ice Age art conveyed such tenderness.
00:16:03200 miles away in the French Pyrenees is a cave called Neo, famous for a very different kind of imagery.
00:16:10I'm going to see it for myself for the first time.
00:16:27The paintings at Neo were made between 12,000 and 14,000 years ago.
00:16:32So the people who made them would have walked through here, barefoot, carrying a flame.
00:16:53Being this deep inside a cave alters your perception.
00:16:56You become aware of your own breathing, of your heartbeat, of your footsteps.
00:17:05Every bump and hollow has the potential to spring to life.
00:17:14Were they led here by something sacred or spiritual that brought them deep inside this alien environment in order to make art?
00:17:21It's surely not chance that most of the images in this cave are found half a mile from the daylight, in a space called the Salon Noir.
00:17:35The assurance of this drawing is extraordinary.
00:17:50In a way this is the closest that I've ever seen.
00:17:53to really sketching in the caves.
00:18:11It's somebody who's very assured of their own ability to evoke an animal.
00:18:16In a single line.
00:18:17What interests me, I think, is the degree to which the main images in this hall seem to be associated with...
00:18:43with death.
00:18:47Very, you know, brutally executed.
00:18:52And there's something very impressive about that.
00:18:58But at the same time, I don't get any, the same sense of sympathy that we've had before.
00:19:06My theory is crumbling in the face of the truth of this, which is, you know, this seems to me to be more about our species' sense of superiority and the right.
00:19:22The right to end the lives of other living things.
00:19:26So it is sad.
00:19:27I mean, when I see an image like that, I think, yeah, that's sad.
00:19:32That is the end of the life of a fine creature.
00:19:36So, the sympathy, empathy, identification, love, isn't here for me.
00:19:51Certainly this is the same hand.
00:19:54And I think we've found the Paleolithic Picasso.
00:19:58He's, you know, he's bloody pleased with himself or herself.
00:20:03You know, bloody good at it.
00:20:04I can, I can, I can command the image of a bison.
00:20:11And furthermore, tell you that I'm going to kill it.
00:20:18Well, it's a bit like Picasso's attitude to women.
00:20:24And I don't, I don't care for Picasso because he was a predator.
00:20:33And I see these images as, in a way, there's two things.
00:20:41The egotism of a human that feels that they are in control.
00:20:49And the egotism of an artist who feels that he can command the image.
00:20:55And in commanding, the image commands the creature.
00:20:58It doesn't open the valves of my sympathy for life.
00:21:05Quite the reverse.
00:21:14And that's shocking and sad.
00:21:22Like so much that has been made since,
00:21:25this is art in which man is asserting his own superiority.
00:21:33Art is a litmus test of our values.
00:21:35I mean, it just tells us what we care about.
00:21:38It tells us what, what makes us feel, er, more alive.
00:21:44I, I think that's what art's supposed to do.
00:21:47Make us feel more alive.
00:21:48But often art is sidestepped into making us feel more tasteful, more powerful, more rich.
00:21:56More special.
00:22:03And seeing this has made me reevaluate this journey.
00:22:06I came here because I wanted to reconnect with what art was for our ancestors,
00:22:14and what it can still be at its best.
00:22:17But here, rather than discovering how art began,
00:22:21the images inside the cave felt like the beginning of the end.
00:22:25I think that what I'm looking for might lie further back in time.
00:22:35The next cave I'm going to see is as far away in time from the artists of Neo
00:22:41as they are from us in the present day.
00:22:44We're going back 28,000 years before the present.
00:22:48I've come here to the Lot Valley, 100 miles north of Neo.
00:23:07Because there's a cave here that contains one of the earliest paintings of animals
00:23:11found anywhere in Europe.
00:23:18The cave of Peshmel was discovered in 1922 by two local boys
00:23:35who were actually looking for prehistoric paintings.
00:23:39Just like at Neo, the cave itself sets your imagination running.
00:23:44Again, there's something extraordinary to me about the response to the,
00:23:55just the sheer physicality of the space.
00:24:00With these, these are like great, you know, if we were in the belly of a whale
00:24:07and he'd just eaten his breakfast and this was like great big mouthfuls of something.
00:24:14You know, you feel somehow in here
00:24:17that we're being privileged to be somewhere very special.
00:24:26What these two boys who first came here discovered was an extraordinary painting.
00:24:37Extraordinary in its beauty but also because it wasn't created with a paintbrush
00:24:43or by scratching lines into the rock.
00:24:46It was created by human breath.
00:24:48Prehistorian Michel Lord Blanchet has spent many years studying this painting
00:25:06to try and unlock the secrets it contains.
00:25:20Here is the panel, the Dotted Horses panel,
00:25:25which all the paintings have been made with the spitting technique.
00:25:31No brushes?
00:25:33No brushes, no. In fact, the artist by his breast,
00:25:38he projected himself with a breast, with his breast onto the rock.
00:25:43And in this beautiful figure, beautiful painting of horses.
00:25:50The man who did the drawing, did six hand stencils
00:25:54and after the hands, the black dots were drawn.
00:26:04There are more than 200 black dots.
00:26:07But the spots go beyond the horse and below the horse and around the horse.
00:26:13So what's happening?
00:26:14Yes. Here, the dots are not the fur, the fur of the animals, of the horses.
00:26:22They are just geometric marks.
00:26:26So they are a kind of emanation of a horse, not the horse itself.
00:26:30Of course.
00:26:31So this is the spirit of the horse.
00:26:33In your interpretation, this is also an image of life.
00:26:38Yes.
00:26:39Everything in here is like, it's becoming.
00:26:42You know, you look in every direction and you see, yeah, these forms that are so complex and, yeah, magical.
00:26:52This is natural, the temple of the nature.
00:26:56And it's a good expression, I think.
00:26:59Nature is already a sort of artist, nature itself.
00:27:05And so man is invited to do the same.
00:27:08He is a member, a part of the nature himself.
00:27:13Michel's insight into this painting is born of experience.
00:27:17He realized that in order to truly inhabit the mind of the prehistoric artist,
00:27:25he must dedicate himself to recreating their art and their methods.
00:27:30Bringing him closer to the art at the moment of its making.
00:27:34The art of its making.
00:27:35The art of its making.
00:28:04The art of its making.
00:28:05The art of its making.
00:28:06The art of its making.
00:28:07In the 1970s, Michel was researching the painting techniques of the Aboriginal Australians.
00:28:24And he realized that some of the Ice Age art in Europe appeared to have been made using the same methods.
00:28:36And he set about trying to recreate the whole frieze of the horses at Peshmer.
00:28:44It gave him an unexpected insight into the ritual involved in the process of painting.
00:28:51Painting is to project oneself onto the rock by the breath.
00:29:06So the breath must be symbolic.
00:29:10Breathing the painting is something very personal.
00:29:16The paintings became part of yourself which is projected onto the rock.
00:29:23And so I had the feeling that these paintings are deeply spiritual actions in the cave.
00:29:34the wine and the music became part of the world in the storage Center.
00:29:47Voilà .
00:29:49It's another way that you make.
00:29:52It's really impressive honestly, Michel.
00:29:55Honestly, Michel, it's completely changed my feeling about what I'm seeing in the caves.
00:30:02Because I thought it was like, one.
00:30:05No, no.
00:30:06And not at all.
00:30:07No.
00:30:08So it's really a long time.
00:30:11It needs, yes.
00:30:13For almost three quarters of an hour to get a good hand stencil.
00:30:20And so this is like really a moment of complete concentration and persistence.
00:30:30That's right.
00:30:31That's right.
00:30:33That's right.
00:30:33And also in the cave, it's necessary to have a light.
00:30:39Yeah.
00:30:39Because the painter can hold the light.
00:30:43Yes, because you have to.
00:30:44Somebody has to hold the light for him.
00:30:46Yeah, yeah.
00:30:47You know what I mean?
00:30:48Beside of him.
00:30:48Yeah.
00:30:49And unless to lead the fire by the wall.
00:30:54Near the wall.
00:30:59The process seems so elemental.
00:31:03They brought fire into the cave for light.
00:31:06And the charcoal the fire made gave them pigment.
00:31:13It's a bit like a bassoon player.
00:31:17Like this.
00:31:17You really have to, like, constrict your lips and, you know.
00:31:26Oh, that's, that's, that's.
00:31:30And, you know, the natural patches here.
00:31:34Yeah, yeah.
00:31:34Are disturbing.
00:31:35Already.
00:31:35Already.
00:31:36Already.
00:31:37No, but it's very, it's, I think that's very beautiful, the way the hand appears out of the rock.
00:31:43Yeah, that's right.
00:31:45That's right.
00:31:46I think that's what makes these handprints unbearably poignant.
00:31:59In some way we know that rocks don't change.
00:32:01And if we want to reflect on our own mortality and the fact that we're here to die.
00:32:16Whereas rocks are here to stay.
00:32:20We do this thing of touching the rock.
00:32:26And we make that touch eternal by blowing pigment around it.
00:32:38In a way it's not the handprint.
00:32:41It is the place that a hand once was.
00:32:45And that's very, you know, to me that, that, that's very deep for my work.
00:32:49My work is absolutely a continuation of that concern with leaving a trace.
00:33:04It could be a shadow, a footprint in the snow.
00:33:10But it deals with the trace of human time.
00:33:13They're all an attempt to say, you know,
00:33:23we exist in time, we're subject to time.
00:33:30And we will not have time quite soon.
00:33:36But how long ago did we first understand these ideas?
00:33:44And was that when art began?
00:33:50I've crossed the border into Spain to come to a cave that we now know
00:33:54contains some of the oldest art made by Homo sapiens anywhere in the world.
00:33:59I want to come here because this could be as close as I can get
00:34:08to the moment when we first understood who we are as humans.
00:34:12When we began to make art expressing our own mortality.
00:34:20This line of 86 red dots is art stripped back to its very essence.
00:34:29It's so beautiful because this is about interval.
00:34:33This is as if we are beginning to understand time.
00:34:38In other words, we can determine interval.
00:34:40We can mark a moment followed by a moment.
00:34:48And it reminds me of being a kid going to school and with a stick
00:34:54tapping on the railings as I walk down Fitzjohn's Avenue.
00:35:01That's the...
00:35:01Every time we come into the caves, we feel the same thing.
00:35:05That this is immediate.
00:35:06This is...
00:35:07This could have been made yesterday.
00:35:08It is present.
00:35:10It makes us more present in the time of our own movement
00:35:14through these spaces.
00:35:16And it's so...
00:35:19moving.
00:35:19We always ask that question.
00:35:27What does this mean?
00:35:28What does this represent?
00:35:32And it's escaped from that kind of meaning and that kind of picturing.
00:35:39This is just saying...
00:35:40Here, now, here, now, here, now.
00:35:50And that's about as good as art gets.
00:35:57But this is not the whole story.
00:35:59In the last ten years, new evidence has come to light that suggests
00:36:08that there is art that is much, much older than this.
00:36:18When modern humans, Homo sapiens, arrived in this part of Europe 42,000 years ago,
00:36:25a now extinct species of human, Neanderthals,
00:36:28had already been living here for hundreds of thousands of years.
00:36:35The classic image of Neanderthals is that they had inferior minds
00:36:39and were not capable of the self-reflection it takes to make art.
00:36:44But it turns out we may have underestimated our human cousins.
00:36:50In 2012, a team led by Professor Alastair Pike
00:36:54was experimenting with a new dating technique
00:36:57to find ages for those cave paintings
00:36:59that had been impossible to date before.
00:37:03His initial research focused on an area of El Castillo
00:37:07where red-painted discs sit alongside another now familiar image.
00:37:12So this is the panel of hands.
00:37:16And there are more than 40 hand stencils arranged on this wall.
00:37:21They're quite ghostly, aren't they?
00:37:24It's a person, isn't it?
00:37:25You see the absence of hand.
00:37:27Yeah.
00:37:27And the significance of that is you can't make one of these accidentally.
00:37:31So if you were to put your hand in some red mud
00:37:33and fall against the cave wall,
00:37:35you'll leave a handprint,
00:37:37but it may not have been intentional,
00:37:39whereas you can't make this accidentally.
00:37:40It was a deliberate act of creating a hand stencil.
00:37:43And you can see that many of these hand stencils
00:37:48and red discs that are on here
00:37:50are covered in this white substance,
00:37:53which is calcium carbonate.
00:37:55It's the same material that's formed
00:37:57when stalagmites and stalactites form.
00:37:59And because it's forming on top of some of these hand stencils,
00:38:02that gives us a minimum age,
00:38:03nearly 37,000 years for this hand.
00:38:06Good.
00:38:06And just to the right of it is a red disc,
00:38:09rather like the ones you were looking at
00:38:11in the corridor of discs.
00:38:13And this is older than 40,800.
00:38:17It's a matter of faith that you believe
00:38:19there are discs in there.
00:38:23So this calcite formed just after
00:38:26the arrival of modern humans.
00:38:28But there's an unknown amount of time
00:38:30between the painting being done
00:38:31and the calcite forming.
00:38:35So on the one hand,
00:38:36this red disc and possibly the hands,
00:38:39which we think were made at around the same time,
00:38:40were amongst the earliest paintings
00:38:43that modern humans did
00:38:44when they arrived in Europe.
00:38:46Or if there was a time delay
00:38:48of more than a few thousand years
00:38:49between the painting
00:38:50and the formation of the calcite,
00:38:52then this red disc must have been made
00:38:54by a Neanderthal.
00:38:56If it's true that Neanderthals were making art,
00:39:00it changes all our ideas about how art began.
00:39:04To find out for sure,
00:39:06Alistair took more samples from calcium deposits
00:39:09on other images in caves across Spain.
00:39:12These are some pictures that we took
00:39:14when we were taking samples for dating
00:39:17from Maltravieso Cave in Cacarese
00:39:19in the west of Spain.
00:39:21And this cave has an unusually high number
00:39:24of red hand stencils in it.
00:39:25And we found a hand stencil in here
00:39:28that had calcite on it
00:39:31that showed that it dated to older than 66,000.
00:39:35Wow!
00:39:36Now this is 25,000 years
00:39:38before humans arrived in Spain.
00:39:41So there's absolutely no question
00:39:43that this must have been made by a Neanderthal.
00:39:49With this extraordinary research,
00:39:52Alistair Pike and his team
00:39:53have reset the clock on when art began,
00:39:58pushing it back by 25,000 years.
00:40:07And if our cousins, the Neanderthals,
00:40:10were making art,
00:40:12it opens up the possibility
00:40:14that art goes much further back
00:40:16in our human family tree.
00:40:18And we were not the first,
00:40:19but simply the most recent type of human
00:40:22to harness the power of art.
00:40:25So you now have a picture
00:40:27of modern humans arriving in a Europe
00:40:30where the caves are already painted.
00:40:33So Alistair, does that mean
00:40:35that the impetus for making art
00:40:39in some senses is Homo sapiens' response
00:40:43to the traces of Neanderthal art
00:40:46that were already in the caves?
00:40:48Well, if you only look at the European evidence,
00:40:51you might come to that conclusion.
00:40:53But in fact,
00:40:54there have been some recent amazing discoveries
00:40:56on the other side of the world
00:40:57that suggest a very different picture
00:41:00for understanding the origin of human art.
00:41:08Thousands of miles away,
00:41:10on the island of Sulawesi in Indonesia,
00:41:13another group of scientists
00:41:14have made an extraordinary discovery.
00:41:16They found art here
00:41:25made by human beings
00:41:26who'd had no contact
00:41:28with the people of Europe,
00:41:29who were living in a place
00:41:31where no Neanderthals had been before them.
00:41:34And yet, they found evidence
00:41:36that people started to paint
00:41:37in the caves in these mountains
00:41:39at almost exactly the same time
00:41:41as the first humans
00:41:42were painting in Europe.
00:41:43were these two isolated groups of people
00:41:51motivated to make art
00:41:52at the same time
00:41:53for the same reason?
00:42:00I've come to meet
00:42:01the person responsible
00:42:02for dating the art here,
00:42:04geochemist Maxime Aubert.
00:42:06Hello, Anthony, Max.
00:42:18Maxime.
00:42:18How are you?
00:42:19Very well.
00:42:19Lovely to see you.
00:42:21Me too.
00:42:21Goodness.
00:42:22Welcome to Lieng-Sacapao.
00:42:27There is something here in this cave
00:42:30that Maxime thinks I should see.
00:42:31Ah.
00:42:40Wow.
00:42:44We were thousands and thousands
00:42:47of miles away
00:42:48looking at other hands
00:42:52and here we are
00:42:55in a completely different culture,
00:43:00different latitude,
00:43:02different side of the world.
00:43:06The same idea of leaving a mark.
00:43:11What is it that changed
00:43:14in our hominin minds
00:43:17that made us feel
00:43:19that this kind of thing
00:43:21was necessary?
00:43:22I find this really
00:43:25incredibly moving.
00:43:40You know, this is about,
00:43:42on the one hand,
00:43:44you know,
00:43:44you're invited
00:43:45to put your hand
00:43:48and say,
00:43:50I've just high-fived
00:43:52somebody from
00:43:5330,000 years ago
00:43:56and then on the other,
00:43:58no,
00:43:58it's the absolute,
00:43:59it's saying,
00:44:01here is the world,
00:44:02here is what will be
00:44:04long after
00:44:05the person who made it
00:44:08has gone,
00:44:09but also
00:44:09long after I,
00:44:11who come after him,
00:44:12will be gone.
00:44:14It's apparently like
00:44:1730 years ago,
00:44:19this whole thing
00:44:20was painted,
00:44:20the whole ceiling
00:44:21of this cave
00:44:22was completely painted,
00:44:23so there's still
00:44:24some painting
00:44:24on that side
00:44:25and this has all collapsed,
00:44:27it's all gone now.
00:44:28That's the old rock face
00:44:29and when it's white,
00:44:30it's the new rock face
00:44:31and you can see
00:44:32like bits of the painting
00:44:33that went through
00:44:35the old surface,
00:44:36but this is all collapsed,
00:44:38this is all gone.
00:44:39So this is not the same thing
00:44:41as the cave in France
00:44:42where it's deep
00:44:42and it's cold,
00:44:43but here it's really wet
00:44:44and humid,
00:44:45so the further deep
00:44:46you go inside the cave,
00:44:47the more humid it is.
00:44:50Increasing pollution
00:44:51over the last 30 years
00:44:53means that this art
00:44:54is disappearing,
00:44:56just as its significance
00:44:58is being understood.
00:45:00For Maxime,
00:45:01this is most serious
00:45:02when it affects art
00:45:03that is unique
00:45:05to this area.
00:45:06If you come maybe here
00:45:08and look on your back
00:45:10and look at this pig here,
00:45:13so you can see
00:45:15there's a really large
00:45:16animal painting
00:45:17of a pig
00:45:18and you can see
00:45:18the legs there
00:45:19and you can see
00:45:20the hoof, you know,
00:45:21and then all of the body
00:45:24here, the head
00:45:25and there's the nose
00:45:26and you can see
00:45:26the snout
00:45:27and the mouth,
00:45:28all the details.
00:45:30Is this done with a finger
00:45:31or is this done
00:45:32with a brush?
00:45:33There's some really details
00:45:35like it would be
00:45:35really hard to do
00:45:36I think with a finger.
00:45:37look at the mouth here,
00:45:39like it's really fine details.
00:45:41What are these strange
00:45:43balloon-like animals?
00:45:46Yeah, well,
00:45:47we think it's a barbarossa.
00:45:48That's a type of pig,
00:45:50like a wild pig
00:45:51around here,
00:45:51but it's pretty rare now.
00:45:59The significance
00:46:00of these animal paintings
00:46:02lies not just
00:46:03in the choice of animal
00:46:04that they painted.
00:46:08Maxime is taking me
00:46:09to a cave
00:46:10called Liang Tempuseng
00:46:11where he found
00:46:13a painting
00:46:13of a barbarossa
00:46:14that brought this art
00:46:16to the attention
00:46:17of the world.
00:46:17all right, Anthony,
00:46:31so this is it.
00:46:34Oh, yeah.
00:46:35So here we have
00:46:36a pig,
00:46:37a barbarossa.
00:46:40Incredible.
00:46:40And there's an instant seal
00:46:42on the right-hand side there.
00:46:44I don't know if you can see,
00:46:45but there's a little sample
00:46:46that we took half
00:46:48on the left-hand side
00:46:49of the little finger.
00:46:51And then that provided us
00:46:52a minimum age
00:46:53of about 40,000 years old
00:46:56for that instant seal.
00:46:58And on the barbarossa here,
00:46:59we took a sample
00:47:00and that gave us
00:47:01a minimum age
00:47:02for the pig
00:47:03of 35,000.
00:47:04So that's the oldest
00:47:05figurative art
00:47:06in the world.
00:47:08I mean, this claim
00:47:09is that this is
00:47:10the first,
00:47:11as it were,
00:47:13referential,
00:47:14representational
00:47:15figure work
00:47:16in the world.
00:47:17And that's,
00:47:18you know,
00:47:18that's an extraordinary thing.
00:47:21So what do you
00:47:22put that down to?
00:47:23Maybe like when
00:47:23modern humans arrived
00:47:25here on this island,
00:47:26this island's got
00:47:27lots and lots of
00:47:28like specific species,
00:47:30like endemic species
00:47:31to this island.
00:47:31So maybe when
00:47:32modern humans arrive here,
00:47:33they're just amazed
00:47:34to see a different kind
00:47:35of, you know,
00:47:35animal that they've
00:47:36never seen before.
00:47:37And maybe that's how
00:47:38it, you know,
00:47:38it becomes special.
00:47:39I like that idea.
00:47:40Yeah.
00:47:41So this is like,
00:47:42this is the way
00:47:43this landscape
00:47:43expresses itself
00:47:45with this form.
00:47:46I like that.
00:47:47I like that.
00:47:47That makes
00:47:48a lot of sense
00:47:49to me.
00:47:55It seems that
00:47:56while we were
00:47:56making dots
00:47:57and hand stencils
00:47:58in Europe,
00:47:59people here
00:48:00had realized
00:48:01that they could
00:48:01draw a picture
00:48:02of something.
00:48:03And those first
00:48:04pictures were
00:48:05of animals.
00:48:07perhaps because
00:48:10they embodied
00:48:11this new landscape
00:48:12or perhaps
00:48:13for reasons
00:48:13that we do not
00:48:14yet understand.
00:48:21An archaeological dig
00:48:22nearby is trying
00:48:23to find evidence
00:48:24about the role
00:48:25of art
00:48:26in the lives
00:48:26of these early people.
00:48:27the team is led
00:48:35by Maxime's colleague,
00:48:37Adam Brum.
00:48:47When the Ice Age
00:48:48artists came here
00:48:49from Africa,
00:48:50they were seeing
00:48:50for the first time
00:48:51a totally different
00:48:52animal world.
00:48:53and so I think
00:48:54really we could
00:48:55be seeing
00:48:56I guess an evolution
00:48:58or a transformation
00:48:59in human spirituality
00:49:00and religion
00:49:01in terms of
00:49:03the level
00:49:04of spiritual
00:49:05connectedness
00:49:05to the animal world.
00:49:07The thing we have
00:49:07to remember here
00:49:08in Siloasi
00:49:09is this is really
00:49:10uncharted territory.
00:49:11I mean you've got
00:49:12to remember
00:49:12that the Ice Age
00:49:13art in Europe
00:49:14is something
00:49:15that's been known
00:49:15for the generations
00:49:16of intensive research
00:49:18has been done.
00:49:19Our Indonesian colleagues
00:49:20have done an incredible
00:49:21job here
00:49:21documenting and recording
00:49:23and discovering
00:49:23all these sites
00:49:24but it's only
00:49:25four years ago
00:49:26we showed that
00:49:27these images
00:49:28are some of the
00:49:28oldest in the world
00:49:29and now we really
00:49:31need,
00:49:31now that we've made
00:49:32that initial breakthrough
00:49:34we really need
00:49:35to understand
00:49:35more about this art.
00:49:39It had always
00:49:40been thought
00:49:40that this urge
00:49:42to create
00:49:42such incredible art
00:49:44had emerged
00:49:45in Europe
00:49:4540,000 years ago
00:49:46but is it now
00:49:48a matter of
00:49:48eventually we can
00:49:50join up the dots
00:49:51so to speak
00:49:52the thousands
00:49:52of kilometres
00:49:53separating this part
00:49:54of the world
00:49:54from the old world
00:49:56from Europe.
00:49:58I believe that
00:49:59it's really
00:50:00just a matter
00:50:01of time
00:50:02until we do see
00:50:03some evidence
00:50:03for similar sorts
00:50:04of art
00:50:05being created
00:50:06at around
00:50:06the same time
00:50:07between here
00:50:08and Europe.
00:50:21Today
00:50:21and the last days
00:50:22have just really
00:50:24opened my mind
00:50:27to the fact
00:50:28that we're looking
00:50:28really at a global
00:50:29picture now.
00:50:31What we're seeing
00:50:32is and we're going
00:50:33to see more
00:50:34and more.
00:50:34The fact is
00:50:35there's very little
00:50:36from Africa
00:50:37at this age
00:50:38that's simply
00:50:38because we haven't
00:50:39looked for it
00:50:40or we haven't
00:50:40looked for it
00:50:41hard enough.
00:50:42There's nothing
00:50:43or very little
00:50:43from India.
00:50:44We haven't looked
00:50:45hard either
00:50:45there.
00:50:46So this story
00:50:48of the earliest
00:50:50art will go on
00:50:52changing
00:50:52and will go on
00:50:53getting deeper
00:50:54and will go on
00:50:55astonishing us.
00:50:56We now know
00:51:01that art began
00:51:02earlier than
00:51:03we'd ever
00:51:03thought before
00:51:04and that it
00:51:05was happening
00:51:06on opposite
00:51:06sides of the
00:51:07world.
00:51:08But for me
00:51:09these discoveries
00:51:10don't answer
00:51:11the most important
00:51:12question of all.
00:51:13Why do we make
00:51:15art?
00:51:17Because the tradition
00:51:18of cave art
00:51:19came to an end
00:51:21in Europe
00:51:21and Indonesia
00:51:22so long ago
00:51:24the answer
00:51:25may not lie
00:51:26here.
00:51:27But there is
00:51:28one part of the
00:51:29world where cave
00:51:30and rock art
00:51:30has continued
00:51:31to be made
00:51:32almost to the
00:51:33present.
00:51:35Humans first
00:51:36came to Australia
00:51:37from Indonesia
00:51:3860,000 years ago
00:51:40and it's here
00:51:41in the Australian
00:51:42wilderness
00:51:43that I hope
00:51:44to find answers
00:51:44to the deepest
00:51:45mystery.
00:51:47What art
00:51:48means to us.
00:51:51This is the
00:51:56Kimberley
00:51:56in Western
00:51:57Australia.
00:51:59This vast
00:52:00wilderness
00:52:00three times
00:52:01the size of
00:52:02England
00:52:02is home
00:52:04to the most
00:52:04breathtaking
00:52:05variety of rock
00:52:06art
00:52:06anywhere in the
00:52:07world.
00:52:09And it's art
00:52:10that some believe
00:52:11although not yet
00:52:12definitively dated
00:52:14could be older
00:52:15than anything
00:52:16we've yet seen.
00:52:19I'm joining
00:52:20a small team
00:52:21of scientists
00:52:21from the
00:52:22University of
00:52:23Melbourne
00:52:23who've come
00:52:24to take samples
00:52:25for further study.
00:52:31This land
00:52:32belongs to the
00:52:33Balangara people.
00:52:36Their spiritual
00:52:37beliefs govern
00:52:38their relationship
00:52:39with the land,
00:52:40with plants
00:52:41and animals
00:52:42and with the
00:52:43art here.
00:52:45So we need
00:52:46to be purified
00:52:47in a smoking
00:52:48ceremony
00:52:48before we can
00:52:50visit their
00:52:50secret sites.
00:52:51The art here
00:53:02is not hidden
00:53:03deep inside
00:53:04caves
00:53:05but the
00:53:07landscape itself
00:53:08is so extreme
00:53:09that much of
00:53:10the art
00:53:10has remained
00:53:11unknown
00:53:12to the wider
00:53:13world.
00:53:13One of the
00:53:20traditional
00:53:21owners,
00:53:21Edo French,
00:53:22is taking me
00:53:23to see a piece
00:53:24of art
00:53:24that was discovered
00:53:25only two days
00:53:26ago.
00:53:37And trying to get
00:53:38to it,
00:53:38you can understand
00:53:39why.
00:53:43Oh, boy.
00:54:06This is the real
00:54:08thing.
00:54:13This is
00:54:22absolutely
00:54:24magnificent.
00:54:29So this is
00:54:31a life-size
00:54:32kangaroo
00:54:33mid-leap.
00:54:37It's just
00:54:38fantastic,
00:54:40really,
00:54:40really,
00:54:41this is a
00:54:41moment of
00:54:42lived time
00:54:43captured
00:54:43through
00:54:45exactly what
00:54:46we were
00:54:46finding in
00:54:47France,
00:54:49that feeling
00:54:50of being
00:54:52the animal.
00:54:52It's just
00:54:53fantastic.
00:54:54Right arm,
00:54:56open,
00:54:58you know,
00:54:59sensing space.
00:55:01But the main
00:55:02thing is
00:55:02she's totally
00:55:04alive.
00:55:06And it's
00:55:07painted with
00:55:08such assurance.
00:55:10A single
00:55:10stroke from
00:55:11the haunches,
00:55:12from the shoulder
00:55:13blades of the
00:55:14front arms
00:55:15that runs
00:55:16after being
00:55:17pressed.
00:55:18If you had a
00:55:19fully loaded
00:55:20Chinese brush
00:55:21absolutely full of
00:55:22pigment,
00:55:22you would press it
00:55:24hard against the
00:55:24surface and then
00:55:26drag it all the
00:55:28way to the
00:55:29beginning of the
00:55:31tail.
00:55:31The whole thing
00:55:32is about life,
00:55:35about movement,
00:55:37about alert,
00:55:38aware,
00:55:38alive.
00:55:39And it's,
00:55:43well,
00:55:43I think this
00:55:45connects so
00:55:46powerfully with
00:55:48what we saw,
00:55:49I think,
00:55:51to some extent
00:55:53in Sulawesi,
00:55:54but certainly
00:55:55in Von Riegelm.
00:55:58Absolutely
00:55:59magnificent.
00:56:01There's art of
00:56:08this quality
00:56:08absolutely
00:56:09everywhere here.
00:56:11But what
00:56:12differentiates it
00:56:13from the art of
00:56:14Europe is that
00:56:15it's broken free
00:56:16from that narrow
00:56:17palette of subjects
00:56:18we've seen in
00:56:20France and Spain.
00:56:23There are animal
00:56:25paintings, of course,
00:56:26but there's also art
00:56:27that reflects the
00:56:28natural world in a way
00:56:30that we haven't seen
00:56:31before.
00:56:36And nowhere is this
00:56:38more apparent than
00:56:39in the place that
00:56:40Edo has now brought
00:56:41me to.
00:56:43That's fantastic!
00:56:49They're so delicate.
00:56:54This is like some,
00:56:58like, Japanese
00:56:59delicate
00:57:01celebration of water
00:57:05water plants.
00:57:09Wonderful.
00:57:11And even the
00:57:12coloration is so
00:57:13lovely.
00:57:13The yellow
00:57:14ochre inside the pod
00:57:16and then
00:57:17these reaching
00:57:19fine, fine leaves
00:57:22that come up
00:57:24out of the surface
00:57:25of the water.
00:57:27It's really beautiful.
00:57:29I'm starting to feel
00:57:35that the art here
00:57:37is revealing
00:57:37a different
00:57:38relationship
00:57:39between man
00:57:40and nature
00:57:40than in the
00:57:41paintings we
00:57:42saw in Europe.
00:57:44Alongside
00:57:45beautiful images
00:57:46of plants
00:57:46and animals,
00:57:48there are
00:57:48paintings of
00:57:49something hardly
00:57:50ever depicted
00:57:51in Europe.
00:57:53Humans.
00:57:53The main thing
00:57:55thinking about this
00:57:57transition between
00:57:58where we've been
00:57:59and where we are
00:58:00now, here are
00:58:02human images,
00:58:05but not just
00:58:05human images
00:58:07crudely painted
00:58:08as a sign,
00:58:10but human images
00:58:12that celebrate
00:58:13a life,
00:58:15a whole collective,
00:58:18communal life.
00:58:19across the
00:58:23Kimberley
00:58:23we find
00:58:24paintings
00:58:25of human
00:58:26figures
00:58:26swept up
00:58:28in ecstatic
00:58:29celebration.
00:58:31In Europe
00:58:31we painted
00:58:32animals
00:58:32because they
00:58:33embodied
00:58:33the qualities
00:58:34we lacked,
00:58:35but in Australia
00:58:36it seems
00:58:37we're no longer
00:58:38jealous
00:58:39of the collective
00:58:40vitality
00:58:40of the animals
00:58:41because we
00:58:42possess it
00:58:43ourselves.
00:58:44we've
00:59:02come to rest
00:59:04on a ledge
00:59:05halfway between
00:59:06the ground
00:59:06and the sky
00:59:07and we're
00:59:08seeing an image
00:59:10that I can't
00:59:11help respond
00:59:12to as a
00:59:14very positive
00:59:15and life
00:59:16affirming
00:59:17thing.
00:59:23We've got
00:59:24two figures,
00:59:25one much darker
00:59:26than the other
00:59:26and it's almost
00:59:27like one is
00:59:28the shadow
00:59:28of the other
00:59:29and in this
00:59:30case,
00:59:30the darker
00:59:31is actually
00:59:33the thing
00:59:33that is projecting
00:59:34this lighter
00:59:35shadow on the
00:59:36back,
00:59:36but they
00:59:36mirror each
00:59:39other almost
00:59:40perfectly.
00:59:42There's a
00:59:43feeling of
00:59:43togetherness
00:59:46but also
00:59:48just joy.
00:59:56It's an
00:59:57extraordinary
00:59:58thing really
00:59:59if we
00:59:59started this
01:00:00journey with
01:00:01animals
01:00:02somehow
01:00:04in this
01:00:06suspended animation
01:00:09that nevertheless
01:00:10conveyed a
01:00:11kind of feeling
01:00:12of conjuring
01:00:13of life.
01:00:15Here we have
01:00:15the same thing
01:00:16but focused
01:00:17entirely on
01:00:19a human being
01:00:20and a very
01:00:22strong
01:00:23communicated
01:00:24sense of
01:00:26confidence
01:00:26of being in
01:00:29the world.
01:00:29at a moment
01:00:40where our
01:00:41species seems
01:00:42to be treading
01:00:43so heavily
01:00:44on the face
01:00:44of this earth
01:00:45it's just
01:00:46lovely to
01:00:47come here
01:00:47where there
01:00:49are no roads
01:00:50there are no
01:00:50railways
01:00:53there are no
01:00:53pylons that
01:00:55stalk across
01:00:55the land.
01:00:56it is truly
01:00:58a wilderness
01:00:59and yet in
01:01:01that wilderness
01:01:02are images
01:01:02of us
01:01:03in our
01:01:04native state
01:01:05as artists
01:01:07and human
01:01:09beings.
01:01:09but alongside
01:01:23these new
01:01:24forms
01:01:25there is a
01:01:26more familiar
01:01:26image here
01:01:27too
01:01:28one that
01:01:29shows us
01:01:29just how
01:01:30universal art
01:01:31is
01:01:31in trying to
01:01:33understand our
01:01:33place in the
01:01:34world.
01:01:38Here is
01:01:39something that
01:01:41speaks across
01:01:42all the
01:01:43continents
01:01:43that we've
01:01:44looked at
01:01:44or all the
01:01:45different
01:01:47geographies
01:01:48here is a
01:01:49hand
01:01:49stencil
01:01:51almost identical
01:01:54to my
01:01:55hand size.
01:01:57Here
01:01:57is the hand
01:01:58reaching out
01:01:59to us
01:02:00that we
01:02:01found in
01:02:02France
01:02:02we found
01:02:03in
01:02:03Sulawesi
01:02:04and now
01:02:06here it is
01:02:06again.
01:02:08It still
01:02:08strikes me
01:02:10as a
01:02:10complete
01:02:11miracle
01:02:11that
01:02:13spontaneously
01:02:14it seems
01:02:16very separated
01:02:18communities
01:02:18of modern
01:02:20man
01:02:20found it
01:02:21necessary
01:02:22to do
01:02:23this thing
01:02:24leave
01:02:25this
01:02:25sign
01:02:26of
01:02:27being
01:02:30in a
01:02:31particular
01:02:32place.
01:02:33you know
01:02:36for me
01:02:36this
01:02:36journey
01:02:37this
01:02:37journey
01:02:38the
01:02:39journey
01:02:40of
01:02:40making
01:02:40this
01:02:40film
01:02:41is
01:02:44in a
01:02:47way
01:02:47a
01:02:47journey
01:02:48about
01:02:49the
01:02:53consistencies
01:02:54in
01:02:54this need
01:02:57a
01:02:58human
01:02:59need
01:02:59to
01:03:00express
01:03:01in a
01:03:02way
01:03:02the
01:03:02inexpressible
01:03:03or
01:03:03the
01:03:04things
01:03:07about
01:03:08life
01:03:08that
01:03:08are
01:03:09not
01:03:09to do
01:03:10simply
01:03:11with the
01:03:11support
01:03:12of the
01:03:12body
01:03:12art
01:03:14has
01:03:14always
01:03:15wanted
01:03:16to go
01:03:16beyond
01:03:16the
01:03:17horizon
01:03:17beyond
01:03:19the
01:03:19limit
01:03:20and
01:03:20I
01:03:21think
01:03:21touch
01:03:22the
01:03:22that
01:03:26which
01:03:26cannot
01:03:27be
01:03:27perhaps
01:03:30logically
01:03:31explained
01:03:32or
01:03:33transmitted
01:03:33in
01:03:34words
01:03:34the
01:03:36universality
01:03:37of this
01:03:38gesture
01:03:38of leaving
01:03:39a present
01:03:40absence
01:03:41that isn't
01:03:41the thumbprint
01:03:43it is
01:03:43simply
01:03:44the
01:03:44outline
01:03:45that
01:03:47registers
01:03:48a moment
01:03:49of lived
01:03:49time
01:03:50against
01:03:51the truth
01:03:52of geological
01:03:53time
01:03:53and the
01:03:55need to
01:03:55do that
01:03:56has expressed
01:03:59itself
01:04:00all over
01:04:01the surface
01:04:02of this
01:04:02planet
01:04:20the
01:04:28practice
01:04:28of painting
01:04:29in the
01:04:29caves
01:04:30of europe
01:04:30came to
01:04:31an end
01:04:31about
01:04:3110,000
01:04:32years
01:04:32ago
01:04:33whatever
01:04:35need
01:04:36it had
01:04:36served
01:04:37was
01:04:37over
01:04:38but
01:04:42but here
01:04:43in the
01:04:43kimberley
01:04:44rock art
01:04:44is still
01:04:45a part
01:04:46of spiritual
01:04:47life
01:04:47edo's
01:04:52father
01:04:53ogie
01:04:53has come
01:04:54to take
01:04:54us
01:04:54to a
01:04:55place
01:04:55that
01:04:55is
01:04:55special
01:04:56to
01:04:56him
01:04:56and
01:04:57his
01:04:57people
01:04:57according
01:05:09according to
01:05:12their
01:05:12tradition
01:05:12the spirit
01:05:13of the
01:05:13creation
01:05:14being
01:05:14lives
01:05:15here
01:05:15ogie
01:05:16has
01:05:16to call
01:05:16out
01:05:17to
01:05:17introduce
01:05:18me
01:05:18and
01:05:18seek
01:05:19permission
01:05:19to
01:05:19visit
01:05:20the
01:05:20site
01:05:20see
01:05:29there's
01:05:29a
01:05:30rock
01:05:30out
01:05:31up
01:05:31there
01:05:31oh
01:05:33wow
01:05:33the
01:05:36other
01:05:37tribe
01:05:37they call
01:05:38it
01:05:38but
01:05:38we call
01:05:40it
01:05:41Woolara
01:05:41Woolara
01:05:43yeah
01:05:44and
01:05:46tell
01:05:46me
01:05:47what
01:05:47what
01:05:48what
01:05:48does
01:05:48Woolara
01:05:49look
01:05:50after
01:05:51look
01:05:51after
01:05:52water
01:05:52and
01:05:54the
01:05:54land
01:05:55trees
01:05:57the fruit
01:05:57the grass
01:05:59and
01:06:01it brings
01:06:01the rain
01:06:02we'll come
01:06:04and talk
01:06:04to the Woolara
01:06:05when
01:06:05when the rain
01:06:06keep
01:06:07going
01:06:07going
01:06:08we come
01:06:08to speak
01:06:09to the
01:06:09Woolara
01:06:10to
01:06:10steady
01:06:11down
01:06:12the rain
01:06:12how long
01:06:14ago
01:06:14was it
01:06:15your father's
01:06:16father
01:06:16painted this
01:06:17or
01:06:17even
01:06:18further
01:06:19back
01:06:19yes
01:06:19further
01:06:19back
01:06:20further
01:06:20back
01:06:20yes
01:06:20so
01:06:21would you
01:06:23say
01:06:23would you
01:06:23say
01:06:24this was
01:06:24earlier
01:06:26time
01:06:26or
01:06:26a dream
01:06:28time
01:06:28or
01:06:28what
01:06:29what
01:06:29what is
01:06:30this
01:06:30early
01:06:30time
01:06:31early
01:06:32time
01:06:32before
01:06:34some
01:06:36some people
01:06:36say
01:06:36they've
01:06:37been there
01:06:38before
01:06:38Christ
01:06:39right
01:06:41so that's
01:06:43older than
01:06:442000 years
01:06:45did
01:07:01did your father
01:07:01bring you
01:07:02here
01:07:02and his father
01:07:05brought him
01:07:06here
01:07:06we put a
01:07:22handprint there
01:07:23ah
01:07:24oh what
01:07:24that's yours
01:07:25that's me
01:07:26and my
01:07:26two brothers
01:07:27you and your
01:07:28two brothers
01:07:29one in the middle
01:07:30that's me
01:07:30so you were
01:07:32small
01:07:32yeah
01:07:33how old were
01:07:34you when you
01:07:35came
01:07:35I was maybe
01:07:37about
01:07:3710 11
01:07:41and you made
01:07:43that by just
01:07:44putting your
01:07:45hand in
01:07:46red ochre
01:07:47we put our
01:07:51hands
01:07:51so we could
01:07:52remember
01:07:53us being
01:07:55here
01:07:55when we
01:07:55were
01:07:55small
01:07:56so Augie
01:07:59what would
01:08:00happen to
01:08:00your people
01:08:01if they
01:08:01couldn't
01:08:02have
01:08:02access
01:08:02to these
01:08:03sites
01:08:04we'll just
01:08:06perish
01:08:06and die
01:08:09yeah
01:08:10so these
01:08:12are really
01:08:13like
01:08:13they
01:08:14show your
01:08:15past
01:08:16but they
01:08:16also
01:08:16show your
01:08:17future
01:08:17yeah
01:08:18that's true
01:08:19hmm
01:08:20it's just
01:08:35so amazing
01:08:36that we
01:08:37as it were
01:08:38do have
01:08:39a living
01:08:39connection
01:08:40with
01:08:41those that
01:08:42painted
01:08:42the painting
01:08:44and I
01:08:50think that's
01:08:51what makes
01:08:51this so
01:08:52special
01:08:53in a sense
01:08:54allows us to
01:08:55understand better
01:08:57what we were
01:08:58seeing in
01:08:58Europe
01:08:59because I think
01:09:00there's a
01:09:01there's still
01:09:02a connection
01:09:03with the earth
01:09:04with the topography
01:09:05with the landscape
01:09:06with the flora
01:09:08or the fauna
01:09:08that simply
01:09:10they've disappeared
01:09:11in Europe
01:09:12if this film of ours can convey anything it's a it's the sense of this emergent
01:09:18truth that art was there right from the very beginning it doesn't matter whether
01:09:23it's an individual artist making something only for themselves down the most
01:09:28inaccessible little crack of a deep deep cave or these extraordinary things that can be made out of the world
01:09:39if this film of ours can convey anything it's a it's the sense of this emergent truth that art was there right from the very beginning it doesn't matter whether it's an individual artist making something only for themselves down the most inaccessible little crack of a deep deep cave or these extraordinary things that are made out of the world
01:09:46It doesn't matter whether it's an individual artist making something only for themselves
01:09:51down the most inaccessible little crack of a deep, deep cave,
01:09:55or these extraordinary celebratory panels of the Kimberley.
01:10:05This has reinforced for me something perhaps I always felt,
01:10:08but I'd never seen quite in this way and so repeatedly over so many thousands of miles
01:10:15that art is intrinsic to who we are, that art is probably our better part,
01:10:24and that in some way when uncaptured by political or economic interest
01:10:36it expresses a joy in being, a connection with all living beings.
01:10:44An awareness of the isness of the palpable world,
01:10:52but the absolute and utter need of the imaginative to join it, mark it,
01:11:03and in that marking register our extraordinary ability to reflect on existence.
01:11:13It's easy to think that art is an extra, that it's an add-on, that it's only to be pursued by those with the leisure of the money,
01:11:30and the, in a way, idleness to pursue it, but it's very, very clear that actually it's best to think of it the other way around,
01:11:40that it's the art that makes us, through doing it, seeing it, participating in it in some way, we become fully ourselves.
01:11:53.
01:12:03Recreating the art of our ancestors in the Victorian House of Arts and Crafts, available now on BBC iFlare.
01:12:09Clemmie Burton-Hill opens up the world of classical music to everyone in Classical Fix.
01:12:14Download the BBC Sounds app to listen.
01:12:16.
01:12:26.
01:12:27.
01:12:28.
01:12:29.
01:12:30.
01:12:31.
01:12:32.
01:12:33.
01:12:34.
01:12:35.
01:12:36.
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