A painted ridge : rock art and performance in the Maclear District, Eastern Cape Province, South Africa

A Painted Ridge is a book about the San (Bushmen) practice of rock painting. In it, David Witelson explores a suite of spatially close San rock painting sites in the Maclear District of South Africa’s Eastern Cape Province. As a suite, the sites are remarkable because, despite their proximity to each other, they share patterns of similarity and simultaneous difference. They are a microcosm that reflects, in a broad sense, a trend found at other painted sites in South Africa. Rather than attempting to explain these patterns chiefly in terms of chronological breaks or cultural discontinuities, this book seeks to understand patterns of similarity and difference primarily in terms of the performative nature of San image-making. In doing so, the bygone and almost unrecorded practice of San rock art is considered relative to ethnographically well-documented and observed forms of San expressive culture. The approach in the book draws on concepts and terminology from the discipline of performance studies to characterise the San practice of image-making as well as to coordinate otherwise disparate ideas about that practice. It is a study that aims to explicate the nuances of what David Lewis-Williams called the ‘production and consumption’ of San rock art. Table of Contents PREFACE CHAPTER 1: A PAINTED RIDGE CHAPTER 2: PERFORMANCE THEORY CHAPTER 3: DANCING AND PAINTING—A PERFORMATIVE DYAD? CHAPTER 4: BEHIND THE SCENES CHAPTER 5: PAINTED AND IMPLIED INTERACTIONS CHAPTER 6: SHELTERED PERFORMANCES CHAPTER 7: COMING TO TERMS WITH DIFFERENCES AND SIMILARITIES APPENDICES APPENDIX A: SITE MEASUREMENTS APPENDIX B: SCHEMATIC DIAGRAMS APPENDIX C: IMAGE COUNTS APPENDIX D: DIGITAL ENHANCEMENT PROCEDURES This book explores a suite of spatially close San (Bushmen) rock painting sites in the Maclear District of South Africa’s Eastern Cape Province. As a suite, the sites are remarkable because, despite their proximity to each other, they share patterns of similarity and simultaneous difference. ABSTRACT 7 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 8 CONTENTS 9 LIST OF FIGURES 12 PREFACE 14 CHAPTER 1: A PAINTED RIDGE 17 The problem with ‘sites’ 21 An overview of previous Maclear District rock art research 23 Ethnographic analogy and San performance 25 Documenting the MR sites 26 Recording MR rock art 26 Digital enhancements 27 Enhancing the MEL ridge 28 From observations to theory 30 CHAPTER 2: PERFORMANCE THEORY 31 Performance Studies and South African rock art research 31 Performance Studies 32 Performance 34 Ritual 34 Performativity 36 The ethnography of performance 37 A Kaluli séance 37 San expressive culture and performances 39 From theory to ethnography 41 CHAPTER 3: DANCING AND PAINTING—A PERFORMATIVE DYAD? 43 Trancing with friends, dancing with death 43 Interactions during a trance dance 48 The dancers and the women who clap and sing 48 Dancers, participants, and the dance fire 49 N|om seekers and masters 50 Masters and other masters 50 Dancers and spirits-of-the-dead 53 Special curing ceremonies 53 From dancing to painting 54 CHAPTER 4: BEHIND THE SCENES 56 The process behind image-making 56 The four stages 59 Acquisition of imagery 59 Manufacture of paint 62 Making rock paintings 65 Using rock paintings 67 From ritual process to interactive images 69 CHAPTER 5: PAINTED AND IMPLIED INTERACTIONS 72 Interactions between image-makers and the rock face 72 Depressions and containment 73 Cracks, steps and edges 84 Idiosyncratic uses of the rock face 93 From simple interaction to complex interactions 93 Interactions between image-makers and images on the rock face 97 Interactions between image-makers and animals 103 Interactions between image-makers and spirits-of-the-dead 107 Interactions between the viewers and the images 111 Summary 113 CHAPTER 6: SHELTERED PERFORMANCES 115 The criteria for image-making performances 115 Who actually made the images? 117 The ritual of image-making performances 119 Reality, non-reality and the social construction of reality 121 Image-makers and failure 123 Summary 123 CHAPTER 7: COMING TO TERMS WITH DIFFERENCES AND SIMILARITIES 125 Limitations 126 Insights from performance theory and future directions 126 APPENDICES 128 APPENDIX A: SITE MEASUREMENTS 129 APPENDIX B: SCHEMATIC DIAGRAMS 130 APPENDIX C: IMAGE COUNTS 139 APPENDIX D: DIGITAL ENHANCEMENT PROCEDURES 141 PROCEDURE 1 142 PROCEDURE 2 143 References 144 Rock,art;,rock,painting;,South,Africa;,Eastern,Cape;,San;,Bushmen;,Ethnography;,Ethnoarchaeology Rock art,rock painting,South Africa,Eastern Cape,San,Bushmen,Ethnography,Ethnoarchaeology