The Creative Ice Age Brain: Cave Art in the Light of Neuroscience

A haunting mystery surrounds the magnificent Ice Age art that is found mainly in the caves of Western Europe. In this substantial new study, scholar Barbara Alpert approaches this art using information from psychology and discoveries in neuroscience. Techniques such as computerized tomography (CT) scans and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) have demonstrated an enormous amount about the working of the brain. By examining the oldest-known human-made images in the light of this new information, Alpert reveals many of the impulses that underlie their creation. In a detailed comparison of Ice Age images with similar examples found throughout art history, Alpert argues that the approach of these earliest artists was not unique, but forms part of a continuum linking the distant past with the present. She shows how the art is based on a visual language found worldwide--one that appears to be universal for our species.

Barbara Olins Alpert is an artist and art historian. She taught prehistoric art at the Rhode Island School of Design between 1988-2000. For many years she has been engaged in field research on rock art in the United States, France, Spain, Sweden, South Africa, India and Australia. A umber of her articles on Ice Age art have appeared in museum journals including Anthropologie published by the Moravske Museum, Brno, Czech Republic and I' Antropologie published by the Musee de l'Homme, Paris. Alpert's understanding of and approach to Ice Age art is deepened by an empathy drawn from her own experience in working with materials not unlike those used by Ice Age artists. She works in a variety of media related to drawing, painting and sculpture. In addition to exhibitions of her work in the United States she has shown work in Malta, Russia, China and Japan. Alpert is a member of Phi Beta Kappa, a summa cum laude graduate of Brown University and Life Member of the Art Student's League. She is listed in the UNESCO publication Who's Who in Rock Art.