Includes bibliographical references (pages 272-290) and index.
Contents:
Foreword / Pierre Soulages -- Introduction: what is 'art'? -- 1. Theories, chimps and children : early attempts to tackle the problem -- 2. Finding art in nature : the first stirrings of an aesthetic sense -- 3. Can we see art in the first tools? : polyhedrons, spheroids and handaxes -- 4. All work and no play? : looking at marks on bones and stones -- 5. Figuring it out : pierres-figures and the first carvings -- 6. Jingles and bangles : the origin of music and decorated bodies -- 7. The first art in the landscape : dots and lines -- 8. The writing's on the wall : the earliest cave art -- 9. A global phenomenon : the appearance of rock art around the world -- Conclusion.
Summary:
Where do we find the world's very first art? When, and why, did people begin experimenting with different materials, forms and colors? Were our once-cousins, the Neanderthals, also capable of creating art? Prehistorians have been asking these questions of our ancestors for decades, but only very recently, with the development of cutting-edge scientific and archaeological techniques, have we been able to piece together the first chapter in the story of art.
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