“The most powerful artwork I have ever seen”
New York Magazine art critic Jerry Saltz has presumably been to most of the finest museums in the world, seen the works of the great masters, and generally spent a lifetime looking at great art. But he encountered what he calls “the most powerful artwork I have ever seen” in a French cave with drawings from about 13,000 years ago.
The idea that perspective was invented in Florence in 1414 collapsed in an instant. Here, larger mammals are in front of smaller ones who trail behind; animals at the back of packs are smaller than those in front. There’s also what’s called reverse perspective, the sort of system used in China, where closer things are rendered smaller than farther things. Elsewhere, an ibex is depicted from behind and over the shoulder — an incredibly sophisticated perspective. One horse is seen from a highly accomplished three-quarters view. Imagery seemed adjusted for curvatures and protrusions of the walls in the same ways that Renaissance frescoes adjust for distortions, distance, and odd viewing angles. I saw a bison with one horn curving up, the other curving down — either from battle or birth. Whatever the cause, this was something that had been seen and intentionally rendered.
Just penciled this in for my next trip to France, whenever that is.
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