The Origin of Art

Mike Bruton’s talk was a story of man’s evolution in response to changing environments. The ability to control fire was the breakthrough to developing a bigger brain. Food, especially meat, could be cooked to provide the energy for powering a bigger brain. As climate warmed, San people could move south to the Cape coast, where shellfish further boosted brain development. One aspect of greater intelligence was the development of art. I will confine my report-back to that topic.

In the Cederberg Mountains, under sandstone overhangs shaped by wind and time, images painted thousands of years ago still enchant us. These images are not simply ancient decoration. According to Mike, they are evidence of one of the most important developments in human history: the emergence of fully modern creativity. We often treat creativity as something optional — a pleasant extra to real life. But what if imagination was one of the key survival tools that allowed our species to thrive? Bruton places San rock art within a much deeper story about the evolution of the human mind. The ability to think symbolically — to imagine unseen worlds, to tell stories, to share complex beliefs — strengthened early communities and helped them make sense of their environment. Symbolic thinking binds groups together. It transmits knowledge. It gives meaning to uncertainty.

The Western Cape holds some of the clearest evidence of this mental leap. In the Cederberg and other mountain ranges, San artists painted antelope with remarkable anatomical precision and fluid movement. Human figures bend forward in trance postures. Some merge with animal forms. These are not simple hunting sketches; they are layered, metaphorical images. Research by archaeologist David Lewis-Williams suggests that many of these paintings emerged from trance experiences during communal healing dances. Shamans described entering spirit realms, transforming into animals, and harnessing supernatural power. The rock surfaces became canvases for translating powerful internal visions into shared, visible form. Even more remarkably, he cognitive foundations for such creativity reach far back in time. At coastal sites such as Pinnacle Point near Mossel Bay and Blombos cave near Stilbaai, archaeologists have found evidence of pigment use and symbolic behaviour dating back more than 160,000 years. By the time the Cederberg paintings were created, the human imagination was already deeply developed.

Seen through this lens, San art is not “primitive” — it is profoundly sophisticated. It reflects abstraction, emotional depth, ecological knowledge and spiritual insight. It tells us that long before written language, humans in southern Africa were thinking metaphorically, reflecting on unseen forces, and expressing complex ideas visually. In other words, they were thinking very much like us.