Across the forests and prairies of Asia, and vast savannahs of Africa, live secret societies of tiny termite architects. They are masters of construction, their sophisticated green-energy designs perfectly adapted to their often hot and arid surroundings. Most homeowners are aware of the destructive power of an army of termites but the fungus termites of […]
The process of creating useful and visually pleasing petroglyphs is one of the more difficult art forms, related more to creating a stone statue than painting. Unlike cave paintings that are added to the rock, petroglyphs involve removing material, in particular the desert varnish or patina that covers rocks in the desert. Today this would […]
If you visit Little Petroglyph Canyon, you will inevitably ask who created these petroglyphs. The short answer is, nobody knows who made them or in fact, how old they are. The Coso people were inhabiting the Coso area when the Europeans first arrived but there were only about 150–250 Coso people in the area and […]
Since both the Little and Big Petroglyph Canyons are within the bounds of the Naval Air Weapons Station China Lake, thus limited for photography, I am including photographs of the surrounding area before delving into the petroglyphs. The southern part of the Coso range lies in the restricted Naval Air Weapons Station China Lake and […]
Within walking distance from downtown Sitka (just 20 minutes from Centennial Hall), a visit to the Raptor Center is the perfect way to stretch your legs and see Alaska’s wild birds up close. Learn about the different species, see their rehabilitation in action, and enjoy a stroll along the grounds. The Alaska Raptor Center’s number […]
Painting
The oldest known paintings are at the Grotte Chauvet in France, claimed by some historians to be about 32,000 years old. They are engraved and painted using red ochre and black pigment and show horses, rhinoceros, lions, buffalo, mammoth, abstract designs and what are possibly partial human figures. In Western cultures oil painting and watercolor painting have rich and complex traditions in style and subject matter. In the East, ink and color ink historically predominated the choice of media with equally rich and complex traditions. Julian Bell noted “A work of art seeks to hold your attention and keep it fixed: a history of art urges it onwards, bulldozing a highway through the homes of the imagination.”
