The construction of social reality through art
Francis Steen I learned from Francis that our human ancestors were scattered loners until they started producing artsy representations of the world (ex: cave painting like the one below), that anchored the development of their group identity: by recognizing the mind, they constructed the self, as if SEEING allowed them to KNOW they were a group. This loads visual arts with a great responsibility in the development of social humankind. I am not sure art is the sole medium or vector of the construction of the group. I naively think that empathy and mirror neurons may play a significant role in the development of the social bound as well - not mutually exclusive.
It was very refreshing for me, given my scientific background, to attend this first presentation of the conference made of words and images only (no statistical analysis!), and see that one can develop so many hypotheses based on the sole visual observation of primitive objects of art. Isn't Francis' job itself really about SEEING and then KNOWING? At the same time, as a scientist, I can't resist to reflect on the limitations of post-processual archaelogogy, and wonder if one can really KNOW only by LOOKING (and thinking).
It was very refreshing for me, given my scientific background, to attend this first presentation of the conference made of words and images only (no statistical analysis!), and see that one can develop so many hypotheses based on the sole visual observation of primitive objects of art. Isn't Francis' job itself really about SEEING and then KNOWING? At the same time, as a scientist, I can't resist to reflect on the limitations of post-processual archaelogogy, and wonder if one can really KNOW only by LOOKING (and thinking).
Cave painting, Chauvet, France
This is part of a series of posts on the 11th International Conference on Neuroesthetics (September 2014).
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