Several weeks ago I sent an electronic-mail message to David Lewis-Williams, whom I consider the foremost authority on cave art today, and with whom I have corresponded about the subject ever since we met in London in 2002. He has persuasively argued that understanding the art of hunter-gatherers from recent times can help us understand the art of prehistoric people. Here is my message in its entirety:

My son, who lives in New York, just sent me a printout of Judith Thurman’s article about cave art in The New Yorker. Entitled “First Impressions,” it came out on June 23 of this year. I was quite stunned by her account, for she does not even mention your seminal book, published in 2002.[1]

Although Thurman has talked with Jean Clottes, and although she mentions your 1996 book with him,[2] as well as your 1988 paper with Dowson,[3] it is clear that she has fallen victim to the French School’s abhorrence of any connection between prehistory and ethnography (ah, Annette Laming-Emperaire!). She mentions that Clottes has had huge problems in the academic community because of his book with you, but she leaves it at that.

I am writing to you because I sense that the French academic establishment is being successful in marginalizing your work. The connection between prehistory and ethnography is banned with some success, or so I fear. Am I correct? Or is this only another instance of ignorance and innocence on Thurman’s part? In my mind, your 2002 book is absolutely crucial for understanding of cave art, and I sincerely hope my fears of academic shenanigans are all wrong.

To my surprise, I got no response for quite some time. A few days ago there finally came a message from Lewis-Williams. “Just back from three weeks in Britain,” he starts. And then he turns to my question: “You are right in all that you say. The French are determined that my 2002 book does not exist.” It has taken me a few days to realize that this exchange should be made public. The connection between prehistory and ethnography lives!

Footnotes

1. Lewis-Williams, J.D., The Mind in the Cave: Consciousness and the Origins of Art, London: Thames & Hudson, 2002.

2. Clottes, J., and J.D. Lewis-Williams, The Shamans of Prehistory: Trance and Magic in the Painted Caves, New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1999 (first published in 1996).

3. Lewis-Williams, J.D., and T.A. Dowson, “The Signs of All Times: Entoptic Phenomena in Upper Palaeolithic Art,” Current Anthropology, Vol. 29, No. 2, 1988, pp. 201-245.