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The charcoal drawings found at Chauvet show a high degree of detail. Copy of the Lions Panel of the Chauvet Cave.

How Our Ancestors with Autistic Traits Led a Revolution in Ice Age Art

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The ability to focus on detail, a common trait among people with autism, allowed realism to flourish in Ice Age art, according to researchers at the University of York.

Around 30,000 years ago realistic art suddenly flourished in Europe. Extremely accurate depictions of bears, bison, horses and lions decorate the walls of Ice Age archaeological sites such as Chauvet Cave in southern France.

Why our ice age ancestors created exceptionally realistic art rather than the very simple or stylised art of earlier modern humans has long perplexed researchers.

Many have argued that psychotropic drugs were behind the detailed illustrations. The popular idea that drugs might make people better at art led to a number of ethically-dubious studies in the 60s where participants were given art materials and LSD.

The authors of the new study discount that theory, arguing instead that individuals with "detail focus," a trait linked to autism, kicked off an artistic movement that led to the proliferation of realistic cave drawings across Europe.

This is a drawing of a horse by Nadia, a gifted autistic child artist (left) and by a typically developing child of the same age (right). Credit: Penny Spikins, University of York

This is a drawing of a horse by Nadia, a gifted autistic child artist (left) and by a typically developing child of the same age (right). Credit: Penny Spikins, University of York

Lead author of the paper, Dr Penny Spikins from the Department of Archaeology at the University of York, said: "Detail focus is what determines whether you can draw realistically; you need it in order to be a talented realistic artist. This trait is found very commonly in people with autism and rarely occurs in people without it.

"We looked at the evidence from studies attempting to identify a link between artistic talent and drug use, and found that drugs can only serve to dis-inhibit individuals with a pre-existing ability. The idea that people with a high degree of detail focus, many of which may have had autism, set a trend for extreme realism in ice age art is a more convincing explanation."

The research adds to a growing body of evidence that people with autistic traits played an important role in human evolution.

Copy of realistic bison drawings found at Chauvet Cave.. (CC BY-SA 4.0)

Copy of realistic bison drawings found at Chauvet Cave.. (CC BY-SA 4.0)

Dr Spikins added: "Individuals with this trait -- both those who would be diagnosed with autism in the modern day and those that wouldn't -- likely played an important part in human evolution and survival as we colonised Europe.

"As well as contributing to early culture, people with the attention to detail needed to paint realistic art would also have had the focus to create complex tools from materials such as bone, rock and wood. These skills became increasingly important in enabling us to adapt to the harsh environments we encountered in Europe."

Top image: The charcoal drawings found at Chauvet show a high degree of detail. Copy of the Lions Panel of the Chauvet Cave. (CC BY-SA 4.0)

The article ‘How Our Ancestors with Autistic Traits Led a Revolution in Ice Age Artwas originally published on Science Daily.

Source: University of York. "How our ancestors with autistic traits led a revolution in Ice Age art: The ability to focus on detail, a common trait among people with autism, allowed realism to flourish in Ice Age art." ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 14 May 2018. www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/05/180514095522.htm

Reference

Penny Spikins, Callum Scott, Barry Wright. How Do We Explain ‛Autistic Traits’ in European Upper Palaeolithic Art? Open Archaeology, 2018; 4 (1): 262 DOI: 10.1515/opar-2018-0016

 

Comments

Maybe they were just good artist and didn't have much else to do. With the exception of, staying fed and staying alive. Autistic is quite a reach.

My reaction to the article is it lacks having enough supporting data. Some autistic folks are great painters but not all great painters are autistic.
Perhaps the earlier cave drawings were viewed by some people later on who simply saw them and thought they could improve on the subject.

This trait is engrained in the fabric of human DNA. To improve on a previous idea...

Well someone really pulled that one out of a dark place. I can only wonder what the intention might be. numero uno--people with autism, aspergers are not known for their creativity. Lineal thinking, yes.
dos-It didn't escape me that there was a colonial spirit mixed up in there. I can only wonder again how a group of learned people would get away with transposing the sickness of our day with ancient ways of living. If we had been living with genocidal proclivity for 100,000 years we wouldn't be here, pondering the past.
Elephants can paint a beautifully stylized depictions of themselves and other things they know well and love...like trees.
Autism is a by product of our times--so few understand it, even though 1 in 60 now have some form of it. Nice try colonizers. Specializing in a field is a sign of autism.

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