Why did the ancient artists create paintings and engravings? What did the images mean? This careful study of rock art motifs in the Trans-Pecos area of Texas and a small area in South Africa demonstrates that there are archaeological and anthropological ways of accessing the past in order to investigate and explain the significance of rock art motifs. Using two disparate regions shows the possibility of comparative rock art studies and highlights the importance of regional studies and regional variations. This is an ideal resource for students and researchers.

Why did the ancient artists create paintings and engravings? What did the images mean? This careful study of rock art motifs in the Trans-Pecos area of Texas and a small area in South Africa demonstrates that there are archaeological and anthropological ways of accessing the past in order to investigate and explain the significance of rock art motifs. Using two disparate regions shows the possibility of comparative rock art studies and highlights the importance of regional studies and regional variations. This is an ideal resource for students and researchers.

Focusing on stunning paintings and engravings from around the world, Powerful Pictures interrogates the driving forces behind global rock art research. Many of the rock art motifs featured in the 16 chapters of this book were created by indigenous hunter-gatherer groups, and it sheds new light on non-Western rituals and worldviews, many of which are threatened or on the point of extinction. Stemming from a conference in Val Camonica in northern Italy, the book is arranged by continent, although it tackles how early research in some countries (e.g., Sweden, France, Spain, the USA, Canada, South Africa) influenced the trajectory of archaeological investigations in others (e.g., Australia, India, Mexico, Germany, Mongolia, Russia). All of the contributing authors have vast experience working with rock art and Indigenous communities, many of them holding posts in prestigious university departments around the world. The book will be of particular interest to professional historians, archaeologists, and anthropologists, and indeed anyone who is interested in art, symbolism, and the past.

Visual Culture, Heritage and Identity: Using Rock Art to Reconnect Past and Present sets out a fresh perspective on rock art by considering how ancient images function in the present. In recent decades, archaeological approaches to rock paintings and engravings have significantly advanced our understanding of rock art in regional and global terms. On the other hand, however, little research has been done on contemporary uses of rock art. How does ancient rock art heritage influence contemporary cultural phenomena? And how do past images function in the present, especially in contemporary art and other media? In the past, archaeologists usually concentrated more on reconstructing the semantic and social contexts of the ancient images. This volume, on the other hand, focuses on how this ancient heritage is recognised and reified in the modern world, and how this art stimulates contemporary processes of cultural identity-making. The authors, who are based all over the world, off er attractive and compelling case studies situated in diverse cultural and geographical contexts.