CHAPTER 1

Archaeologies of Art: Time, Place,

and Identity in Rock Art,
Portable Art, and Body Art
Ins Domingo Sanz, Dnae Fiore, and Sally K. May

Time, place, and identity are some of the main issues archaeologists
try to confront through the empirical and analytical study of visual
arts (rock art, portable art, and body art). The classical view of these
archaeological remains as art for arts sake, created by a gifted individual or having a specific/unique aesthetic quality (for example,
Reinach in Ucko and Rosenfeld 1967) is no longer supported in the
academic arena. Just as with any other archaeological remains, visual
arts are filled with significance and encode many levels of information
about the identity of the artists and their sociocultural context. This
information can be more or less successfully decoded through different
ways of doing archaeology, understood as the study of past societies
through the analysis of their material culture. Archaeological evidence
is usually debris of human activities, often scattered fragments resulting from abandonment or destruction. However, the three particular
artistic endeavours analysed in this book rock art (images painted
or engraved on rocks), portable art (decorated artefacts or artefacts
shaped with specific forms), and body art (images painted or tattooed
on the body) are more than discarded fragments of human activity.
They are both a reflection of, and a constructing force behind, human
culture. Likewise, even if it is internationally accepted that the meaning of the message of past art traditions (particularly when they are
prehistoric) is inaccessible in the present, there are enough data hidden
in the motifs to place them in cultural, spatial, and temporal contexts.
Considered within this context, this book unites international case
studies to explore questions of time, place, and identity through the
archaeological and ethnoarchaeological analysis of rock art, contemporary Aboriginal art, and body art. The long and ongoing debate about
the misuse and in/appropriateness of the term art for past and nonWestern images is not central to this book (see Anati 2002; Conkey and
15

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Hastorf 1990; Fiore 1996; Layton 1991; Leroi-Gourhan 1964; Ucko and
Rosenfeld 1967; among others), and the term is broadly used throughout the chapters as a common denominator of the wide realm of images
created and viewed by past and present human groups in different
parts of the globe.
The chapters in this book reflect this openness in attitudes to art and
of its relationship to time, place, and identity within an archaeological framework. There is a great diversity of frameworks and analyses
reflected in these eleven chapters, and these archaeologies (plural) of art
show that there are several viewpoints to the issue of how time, place,
and identity can be explored through art. At the same time, this selection of chapters shows the limits of each of these viewpoints which, in
turn, relates to the nature of the archaeological questioning and to the
low visibility of many factors in the archaeological record. In line with
this, tackling the issue of, for example, identity in art does not involve
imagining situations but rather tying interpretations and theories to
material correlates. Archaeology can contribute considerably more to
the study of art than picture books and pseudoscience.

Archaeologies versus Archaeology

Plurality is one of the main notions this book embraces, and connotations of this are invoked by each of the concepts tackled in this
volume.
The word art, even if singular, involves the wide range of visual
forms in which artistic creations can be shaped, including the three
main artistic endeavours analysed through this volume, rock art, body
art, and bark paintings (portable art).
Time is conceived in different ways by different cultures, be it lineal,
cyclic, spiral, or simply disregarded as a factor affecting reality (Bailey
1983; Garca Canclini 1986; Gosden 1994; Ridley 1994; Rowlands 1993;
Shanks and Tilley 1987). Approaching such variety of conceptions about
time through a contemporary perspective is clearly a challenge. The
picture becomes even more complex when it is considered that archaeologists deal with fragmentary pieces of material culture. The eleven
chapters in this book represent a small selection of the wide range of
temporal phases or periods recognizable in world artistic production.
These include the Palaeolithic and the current practices of engravers
in Foz Ca (Portugal); the precontact and postcontact artistic traditions of different American populations (Argentina, Chile, Guatemala,
Puerto Rico), the Neolithic art of Mediterranean Spain and the Saharan
groups; and the current artistic practices of three distinct Australian
Aboriginal cultures. In all these cases, time has been conceived more as

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17

an external analytical framework to plot a specific artistic phenomenon

or stylistic sequence (that is, from an etic perspective) than as an internal constituent of art traditions (that is, from an emic perspective).
Place can also be culturally conceived and constructed in a number of
ways, from its conception as an external, objective, and exclusively material frame for human action to its conception as a subjective, animated
being that is an integral part of human existence (for instance, Hernando
2000; Tilley 1994; Ucko and Layton 1999). Again, grasping for the traces
of such conceptions in the archaeological remains of art creations is quite
a challenge, and this is why most of the chapters in this book have tackled the study of place mainly as a particular position or point in space
used for producing, exchanging, or displaying visual arts. Nevertheless,
it is also clear that in many chapters, place has been conceived as a
sociocultural construction, an active socialization of space that has been
brought into cultural life through its visual marking. By selecting case
studies from the four continents (Africa/Namibia, America/Argentina/
Chile/Guatemala/Puerto Rico, Europe/Portugal/Spain, and Oceania/
Australia), we encompasses multiple places and landscapes that have
been partly constituted through the creation of artistic expressions.
We also tackle identity plurally in this book: It is conceived at different scales (from individual to group to society to human species; from
motif, to artefact or body or site, to region, and so on). Moreover, it
involves both past and present identities of art producers/viewers and
present identities of the archaeologists who study them (Hernando 2002;
Jones 1997). These latter are regarded in this book as active agents in
the construction of knowledge, values, and feelings toward other
peoples past and present identities, and, as the chapters of this book
clearly show, their involvement in this process requires a degree of selfawareness in order to develop a critical approach to their own work.
Thus, by discussing Archaeologies this book aims to draw attention
to the connotation of plurality invoked by each of the mentioned concepts. Moreover, the plural use of the word archaeology is consciously
directed to reflect the plurality of methods available to archaeologists
to address the same archaeological questions related to art, time, place,
and identity, and the multiple backgrounds of the researchers contributing to this volume.

Time, Place, and Identity in Focus

Archaeologies of Art aims to understand how artists leave marks of
authorship in the work of art: through a plurality of methods used by
archaeologists worldwide to interpret this information, those marks
of authorship are attributable to specific times, places, and identities.

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Chapter 1

The ethnoarchaeological studies in this book provide the framework to

observe through informed methods how artists negotiate and construct
their individual or group identities through the creation, display, and
consumption of rock, portable, and body art (see chapters by Smith;
May; Taon, Kelleher and King; and Fiore). The archaeological studies of rock art illustrate how the material evidence provides the tools
to reconstruct the identities of societies in the past (see chapters by
Lessen; Gallardo and De Souza; Domingo Sanz; Robinson and Gillette)
and in the present (see chapters by Lus and Garca Diez; and Roe and
Hayward). Far from suggesting the use of ethnographic examples as
direct analogies to interpret art, this book aims to combine ethnography and archaeology to create a more critical and scientific methodology for the archaeological study of visual arts. The ethnoarchaeological
chapters in this book also avoid the use of ethnography as a source of
cautionary tales, since these serve mainly to pinpoint ambiguous factors in material culture patterning but usually do not provide methodological tools to break down such ambiguity and move forward
toward the systematic interpretation of such patterns. Ethnography is
then viewed both as a way of constructing knowledge about the material correlates of creating and displaying visual arts and as a medium
to test archaeological methods for studying visual arts: Both aspects
help to create awareness about the depth and the limitations of archaeological knowledge.
The marks of authorship left by ancient or recent artists are also combined with the marks of authorship left by archaeologists when studying them: this book aims to develop a sense of awareness about the fact
that social identity is not just a past process fixed in time and space but
that it is also rather a malleable process influenced by the archaeologists who are researching it. The different manners in which the issue
of art and identity are tackled through the eleven chapters of this book
are, indeed, a tangible way of demonstrating that social identity is also
inextricably involved in each authors way of doing science.
Within this framework, the unity of the book is given by a series
of key questions addressed by the contributors from their different
archaeological or ethnoarchaeological perspectives and case studies:

How is social identity constructed and/or reproduced by art?

What are the scopes and the limitations of the use of this concept in the
archaeologies of art?
What type of evidence is relevant, and which kind of analyses are
required?
To what extent do we as archaeologists create an identity for past and
present-day people who create/d rock art, portable art, or body art?
What is the role of living art producers and/or people related to ancient art
producers in the current construction of these identities?

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19

To address these questions, the material aspects of identity are the

main source of information. It is accepted that these material aspects
of identity will have a certain spatial and temporal distribution (which
may or may not be archeologically recognisable) and will be liable to
change in place and in time. Furthermore, the material aspects of social
identity are not only distributed through time and space; the ways in
which space and time are conceived, perceived, and manipulated are
constitutive of identity, too.

Constructing Time Frames, Revealing Time Conceptions

As noted above, time can be addressed in archaeology from an etic
perspective, that is, centred on the archaeologists own concepts, and
from an emic perspective, which intends to grasp some of the implications of other peoples conceptions of time which are usually different
from those held by the researcher. The chapters in this book conceive
time mainly as an external framework to locate art diachronically
and are thus based on an etic, western perspective. Yet this does not
mean that the concept of time has remained unchallenged measuring
time and placing art forms within a chronological context has been a
concern for archaeologists worldwide. From the very beginning, relative sequences for both portable and rock art have been proposed on
the bases of stratigraphic superimpositions, stylistic comparison, and
depicted content (extinct animal species, depicted weapons, and so
forth). Radiocarbon dating brought about a revolution between 1940
and 1970, and one could argue that obtaining absolute dates for some
archaeological remains initially degraded the role of rock art as a valuable source of information about past cultural systems. Especially in
North America, only a few archaeologists, artists, and avocationalists kept some interest in rock art while most archaeologists largely
abandoned rock art studies on behalf of other datable archaeological
remains (Keyser 2001:117). But the interest in relative sequences of
rock art and portable art was kept in Europe, South Africa, Australia,
and South America, providing useful analyses reflecting the changing
identities of the artists in time and place (Chaloupka 1993; Domingo
2005; Gonzlez 1977; Leroi-Gourhan 1964; Schobinger and Gradin
1985; Villaverde 1994; and so on).
A second crisis for the relative dating of art forms (especially rock
art) occurred in the 1990s, with the first direct dating of pigments and
engravings (see Lorblanchet and Bahn 1993; Rosenfeld and Smith
1997). The use of style as a chronological marker was then called into
question owing to inconsistencies between absolute dates and stylistic sequences. However, whereas some suggested the revision of

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Chapter 1

stylistic sequences (Valladas and Clottes 2003), others demonstrated

that radiocarbon dates also have limitations owing to the contamination of samples, the use of old woods and charcoal for painting, and so
forth (see Fortea 2002; Pettitt and Bahn 2003; Rowe 2001; Steelman et al.
2005). In this context, relative methods of dating art forms are still useful to provide an order of styles and traditions. And, despite the difficulties to establish their chronometric duration, the validity of relative
methods for the archaeological interpretation of temporality and the
role of visual arts for studying the evolution of past societies cannot
be denied. Time absolute and relative, scientific and social is one of
the necessary frames to conduct an archaeological study of social identities. Therefore, more than keeping the opposition between absolute
and relative time, the perspective developed in this book suggests that
both systems should be complementary to address the long- or shortterm dynamics involved in artistic traditions.
This predominant concept of time as a chronological framework does
not provide direct information about the ways in which it was conceived
by other peoples in the past, nor of the manner in which it was involved
in art creation and use. This situation is probably due to the fact that the
archaeological visibility of past and/or foreign time conceptions is considerably low, particularly when one is dealing with prehistoric contexts.
Nevertheless, it is interesting to note that some subtle inferences about
emic time conceptions have been drawn by some authors by linking
temporality to the actual actions of creating art that entail marking and
re-marking space the bedrock, the artefact, the body through visual
art (see Luis and Garca Diez; Domingo Sanz; Robinson; Gallardo and De
Souza; Fiore). The bedrock, the artefact, the body, can be visually marked
only once, but they were often revisited or reused and repainted or reengraved annually, seasonally, or with some other periodicity. Such actions
are visual appropriations and constructions of space be it a place, an
object, or a person that entail a certain conception of time. Thus, art
spaces always imply a sense of time: short or long, lineal or cyclic, mythical
or mundane. It is clear that these conceptions are still ambiguous in terms
of their archaeological visibility, but the fact that time conceptions can be
related to space through the display of visual and visible art opens a
window of interesting and challenging analytical possibilities.

Locating Place: Spatial Distribution

and Enculturated Landscape
Mapping the geographical continuities and discontinuities between
different types of artistic evidences has also been central to establish the
boundaries of cultures and the social interactions among neighbouring

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groups (see Barth 1969; Carr and Nietzel 1995; among others). This
is especially achievable through rock art studies, since, unlike other
material remains that can be exchanged and traded, rock art is fixed in
place. It was certainly made and meant for the place where it is found
and viewed (Burke and Smith 2004:224). Therefore, it is a relevant
source of data to understand the way space was defined and used in a
specific sociocultural context, the duration and intensity of the occupation, and how the perception of a specific place changed over time in
the construction of social identities (see Lenssen-Erz in this volume).
Hence, rock art is more than painted or engraved images; it is also
place and landscape (Nash and Chippindale 2001:1). It is used to socialize natural environments or to mark path routes (Bradley 2000; Martnez
2000) and to create cultural and/or symbolic spaces (see Robinson in
this volume). Since rock art is inextricably linked to the land (Ross 2001),
it can be completely understood only in relation to its landscape, conceived both in environmental and sociocultural terms. Furthermore, the
physical location of rock art (visibility, access, topography, monumentality, sounds, proximity to water sources, paths, burials or habitats, and
so on), and the morphology of the rock (form, surface, texture, audible
properties of the rock, and so forth) can be as symbolically important
as the rock art itself. Social spaces were constructed according to certain sets of cultural rules, which regulated what kinds of activities were
acceptable at different places in the landscape (Engelmark and Larsson
2005). Therefore, the location of rock art was not usually picked at random, and this is why the recurrent distribution of rock art sites or motifs
can be linked to specific sociocultural groups, informing once more
about the role of art in the construction of their social identities.
Moreover, marking spaces visually creates significant places and
gives them a certain identity; conversely, such marked places become
constitutive of the social identity of those who marked them. This is
also valid for the visual marks made on the body which is probably one of the smallest and most personal spatial scales within a social
group. The creation of body art (be it self-ornament or ornamentation
by a third person) and its display in any context can produce individual
and group identity for the wearer and the viewer; at the same time,
such identity creation can involve the continuation or the interruption
of a preexistent tradition, implying a dialectical relationship between
identity patterns and social agencies (for example, Faris 1972; Strathern
and Strathern 1971; see Fiore in this volume). Furthermore, ephemeral
artistic techniques (for instance, body painting) can be used to construct
multiple and momentary social identities in a single individuals body
along his/her social life, while durable techniques (for example, tattooing, scarification) are by their very materiality oriented toward marking
the body in a non-ephemeral manner, and therefore are commonly used

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Chapter 1

to inscribe and reinscribe (by addition) long-lasting identities on the

body. In this sense, the body can become a very significant place where
social identities can be visually constructed.
Finally, the creation and the manipulation of artistic artefacts involve
simultaneously two spatial levels: that of the artefact itself and that of
the place/s where it was produced, used, maintained, recycled, broken,
discarded. Social identity can be inferred from the ways in which the
physical space of the artefact has been manipulated as a canvas and/
or as a volume to create images (see May in this volume and Smith in
this volume). But the spatial distribution of artefacts as much as that
of rock art can also be significant as a landscape creator and as an
identity marker.
Time and space are, therefore, two essential concepts for approaching identities, but identities can be conceived only by combining both
of them. Understanding spatial variations as markers of ethnicity is
a central issue in archaeology, but this should not be an end in itself:
beyond the reconstruction of a static picture of cultural traits at a particular point in time, archaeologists need to account for diachronic
change in such patterns (Shennan 1989:28). Regional and landscape
archaeological studies are helping to go beyond the traditional linear
sequences constructed in the past, demonstrating the multiscalar temporalities structuring cultural action. They reflect how particular traditions expand or contract through time and how temporal changes do
not necessarily synchronize everywhere, so different regions have specific sequences. Both basic concepts constitute the essential framework
to construct our next concern: identities.

Discovering Identities: On the Relational

Nature of Social Identity
Social identity is one of the central issues of this book, and it is clearly
linked with the previous issues of time and space. The most frequent
tool to approach identities through archaeology is the concept of style,
understood as a way of doing (Hodder 1990; Wiessner 1990) or a characteristic manner of doing something (Sackett 1977:370). Moreover, a
style will be defined by a spatial and temporal invariance in a general
way of doing, inasmuch regularities and specificities in space and time
are particular to a specific epoch and/or region.
The long debate on the concept of style has been summarized in different publications (see Carr and Nietzel 1995; Conkey 2006; Conkey
and Hastorf 1990; Domingo Sanz 2005; Lorblanchet and Bahn 1993;
Wobst 1999; and so on), and this volume pays attention to its relationship
with identities in different chapters (see Smith; Gallardo and De Souza;

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Domingo Sanz; Roe and Hayward). If we accept that rock art, portable
art, and body art are part of the social mechanisms of identity construction, then we assume that stylistic differences can be used to identify
groups and their social identities at different scales. It has long been
accepted that style performs a fundamental function in the processes
of visual communication and information exchange (Wobst 1977). Style
can be defined as the personal and/or group expression of visual communication through created forms (Smith 1996). Yet style is also evident in other less visual aspects of the art-facts such as the choice of
techniques (Dietler and Herbich 1994; Gosselain 1998) and the material
and/or symbolic function of the artefacts (Sackett 1977:330). The selection of different technologies (canvas, raw materials, tools, processing modes, and so on) is not necessarily constrained by ecological and
physical limitations (see Binford 1965) but also closely related to symbolic, religious, economic, and political values (Gosselain 1998:4; LeroiGourhan 1964; Letchman 1977; and so forth), in line with this, technical
actions result from social decisions, which are themselves stylistic.
Furthermore, whereas formal and visual styles can be sometimes easily
imitated or manipulated, technological styles usually require a deeper
learning process and are more difficult to imitate and, therefore, provide
relevant information to explore the more durable facets of social identity (Domingo 2005; Fiore 2006; Gosselain 1998:92). Hence, the recurrent
use of a specific recipe for painting, a certain kind of brush, and so on,
can be evidence of a particular individual or group identity.
Similarly, variations in material culture can be conditioned by the
function they serve. These functional variations are also stylistic since
there is a wide range of equivalent alternatives available to the artists
to obtain the same end (Sackett 1990). In other words, different formal
features (or even technological features, such as different recipes for
pigment, different brushes, and the like) can be selected to create an
art-fact with the same function. So even those features of the art-fact
that could be considered functional (or selected to accomplish a specific
end) can be stylistic, in the sense that there are different options available to the artist to get to the same end and, therefore, the selection he
makes, even if functional, is also stylistic. Therefore, the selection of a
specific alternative, among all the available options, for a specific function makes this selection stylistic. The coexistence of more than one
style with different functions in the same cultural tradition has been
mentioned several times (Layton 1991; Schapiro 1953:294) and in the
Barunga community (Northern Territory, Australia) materialises in a
figurative style used with nonceremonial purposes and in a geometric
style restricted to ceremonies (Smith 1996:241).
To summarise, a particular way of doing can be identified either in the
formal and decorative attributes, or in the functional or technological

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Chapter 1

aspects of an art-fact, since it can appear in any stage of the operative

chain of art production and use.
The nature and the significance of stylistic variations are closely
related with the nature and intentions of the social identities of the artists. These social identities can refer either to the identification of a group,
conceived by Wiessner as emblemic style (1983) and by McDonald
(1990) as protocol, or the identification of individuals, addressed by
Wiessners assertive style category (1983) and by McDonalds panache
category (1990). Approaches to both kinds of processes emblemic
and assertive; protocol and panache shed light on human agency and
social identity and can be made through the study of material culture
in general (for example, Dobres 2000) and through art analysis in particular (see Smith; May; Taon, Keheller and King; Roe and Hayward;
Fiore in this volume). Clearly, interpreting these two different forms
of identity in the archaeological record is complex, especially since
more than one identity will arise and overlap in any given social group
(depending on ethnicity, gender, age, occupation, class, and so on).
In this book, social identity is conceived as a twofold construction, since
it could be created through self-ascription or through ascription by others
(Bonfil Batalla 1972; Daz Polanco 1981, 1984). The former involves the
self-identification of an individual with a group, whereas the latter refers
to the recognition of individuals in a group either by the members of the
group or by outsiders, including the archaeologists who study their material culture. In addition, self-ascription can be conscious or unconscious,
since individuals are not necessarily aware that reproducing certain patterns relates them to a specific group (see also the concepts of Isochrestic
Variation and Iconological Approach defined by Sacket 1982:82). On the
contrary, ascription by others does require a conscious and intentional
factor, since it entails awareness in the recognition of people as pertaining
to a certain group. Nevertheless, the archaeological recognition of features revealing the identity of individuals/groups does not necessarily
require the claim that such features were intentionally manipulated as
identity-badges by people in the past. The chapters in this book show
how art is involved in the construction of identity through both processes. Whereas current indigenous groups often use artistic production to
define their identity in opposition to others (self-ascription) (see chapters
by Smith; May; Luis and Garca Diez), archaeologists create sets of features from rock art to recognize different identities or groups of people
(ascription by others) (see chapter by Domingo Sanz).
The creation and maintenance of social identity operates mainly by
opposition, since any ascription to a group (by self and/or by others)
implies non-ascription to other groups (see Palaeolithic versus nonPalaeolithic in Luis and Garca Diezs chapter; hunter-gatherers versus
shepherds in Gallardo and De Souza; or Selknam versus Yamana in

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Fiore). At the same time, defining what a particular identity involves

requires us to define what such identity does not entail, and sometimes those differences are not well defined, generating many grey
areas between them (for an in-depth discussion about complementary opposition, see Roe and Hayward in this volume).
Depending on the kind of materials manipulated in the creation
and reproduction of gender, age, ethnic and/or other groups, some
social identities have a higher archaeological visibility than others.
The challenge is how to disentangle and study them through the
archaeological record. To face such a challenge, the chapters in this
book provide examples of the application of two different and combinable strategies.
In the first place, it is essential to explicitly define the concepts and
criteria through which social identity will be explored in the archaeological-artistic record. This entails explaining which variables are
considered relevant for the aims of each researcher (form, technique,
subject matters, patterns of composition, spatial distribution in the
site or in the landscape, and so forth) and justifying such relevance in
each specific study. Since there is no unique and common key for all
the components of the material culture, the variables transmitting this
social information will diverge according to the materials analysed,
and the geographical and sociocultural scale of each study.
In the second place, the concepts need to be tied in with empirical
implications that shed light on their visibility in material culture patterns, tendencies and/or odd cases (not everything relevant comes in a
pattern, and odd cases can be as informative as the neatest tendency).
Such an explicit relationship between concepts and material culture is
what then helps to argue for the visibility of social identity in archaeological art. This book shows that both strategies are not faced in the
same manner by every author, which is clearly a reflection of the different academic traditions and identities of the authors as social agents.
Nevertheless, such heterogeneity does not mean that we endorse the
anything goes perspective that fosters extreme relativism; on the contrary, we suggest that making the research criteria explicit and searching
for nexus between concepts and data is a fruitful manner of developing
both archaeological knowledge and academic self-awareness.

Concluding Remarks
This book represents a sample of the different ways in which discussions
of time, place, and identity can be addressed through the archaeological
study of visual arts. The central idea of this volume is that the concept
of identity (individual or group) is a social reality that can be shaped
only attending to a specific time and place and in opposition to others.

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Chapter 1

Either consciously or unconsciously this identity leaves tangible traces

in material culture and, therefore, in its archaeological remains: Such
traces can be read by archaeologists to construct past identities and to
shed light on the involvement of art in this process.
Overall, this book draws together new international research to
reveal the changing ways archaeologists are studying art and the new
information about past societies that is emerging through these changing archaeologies. The ten archaeological studies contained in this book
highlight the high standard of research being undertaken by archaeologists studying art around the world and the role of art in approaching questions of social identity. Finally, the study of art has a long and
complex history dotted with pseudoscience, eccentric explorers, and
fanatical art enthusiasts, but, more significantly, the archaeological
study of art in all its facets continues to enhance our understanding of
human cultural activities throughout the ages.

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