Image and Zeitgeist: The Neolithicization of Rock Art in The American Southwest

Abstract

This essay contributes to the cross-cultural analysis of visual culture in deep time through a study of how farming transformed rock art in the American Southwest. Accepting the interpenetration of economic and artistic modes of production as axiomatic, the study begins with a consideration of pre-agricultural Archaic rock art (8,000 BCE to 500 CE), then turns to consider the Ancestral Pueblo rock art that emerged in tandem with the rise of Neolithic-style villages (500–1800 CE). Archaic images are found to be preoccupied with the indexical traces of bodies (e.g., animal prints, game trails, shadows), and it is argued that their primary function was to guide viewers, in thought and action, toward desired ends. As such, it fits comfortably within an economic mode organized around the scrutinization of natural signs and the pursuit of animals, plants, and visions. A different logic is found to organize Pueblo rock art. Rather than traces of bodies, Pueblo images depicted the bodies themselves, resulting in a profound historical shift from two-dimensional to three-dimensional subject matter and from an emphasis on indexical to iconic meaning. Moreover, whereas Archaic rock art propelled the viewer onward, Pueblo images established pathways designed to draw the primary object of desire—water—inward, toward the home community. As such, it was a fitting mode of artistic production for sedentary farmers who were dependent on rainfall for their wellbeing. The essay concludes with a consideration of the study's potential to inform inquiry into the Neolithic transformation of image production globally.