"Admirable Facsimiles": Coffee Tables, Copying Contexts and Helen Tongue's Rock Art Book c1909. Issue 4 (4th July 2021)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Weintroub, Jill; de Harde, Laura
• Is Part Of: Critical arts. Volume 35:Issue 4(2021)
• Page Start: 84
• Page End: 102
• Publication Date: 2021-07-04
• Subjects: Helen Tongue -- Elizabeth Mannsfeld/Goodall -- Maria Weyersberg -- George Stow -- Origins Centre -- Susan Sontag -- Harrismith District -- Frobenius Institute; Mass media -- South Africa -- Periodicals; Mass media and the arts -- South Africa -- Periodicals; 302.230968
• DOI: 10.1080/02560046.2021.1955940
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0256-0046

Abstract

ABSTRACT: What can we learn from studying and comparing the methods by which early researchers approached the practice of rock art reproduction? In this paper, we look at examples of painted reproductions made during the opening decades of the twentieth century. We suggest that a focus on the formal qualities of such copies and the intricacies employed by copyists in their work of translating the rock art from its multidimensional many-hued rock surface onto a flat, one-dimensional paper surface offers potential for reinvigorating rock art displays at the Origins Centre. In addition, this approach offers an opportunity to craft a narrative that affirms the contribution of individual creativity and embraces the nuance and uncertainty that remains at the heart of scholarly research and knowledge-making. We suggest that displays of copies and artworks produced by copyists, showing how these are part of an historical trajectory of art making and research production, allows an enriched engagement with how we understand the art itself, as well as how artistic practice may be recast as scientific method.