Signs and Images in Prehistoric Art: New Data, Recent Findings, and Current Research Directions

Abstract

The article integrates the data reported at the All-Russian conference with international participation «Signs and Images in the Art of the Stone Age», commemorating the tercentenary of the Russian Academy of Sciences and held at the Institute of Archaeology and Ethnography SB RAS in Novosibirsk Akademgorodok on October 21–24, 2024. During the event, various aspects of Stone Age art and symbolic behavior were discussed. We outline the key issues raised in geographically and temporally wide-ranging conference talks and in ensuing discussions, many of which concerned cave and rock art dating to the Paleolithic and to the Pleistocene-Holocene transition in Europe, North Africa, China, the Eastern Pamir, Mongolia, and Russia. Many experts focused on symbolic behavior during the Paleolithic, Mesolithic, and Neolithic on the Russian Plain, in Crimea, in the Urals, in the Altai Mountains, in the Minusinsk Basin, in Western Transbaikal, and the Yana-Indigirka lowland. The significance of the conference for further research is highlighted. We touch upon various approaches to ancient mineral pigments, technology of prehistoric art, and the environmental context of sites. Testifying to the high level and wide scope of prehistoric art studies, the conference outlined important prospects for further research.