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Article Dans Une Revue Travaux du Comité français d'Histoire de la Géologie Année : 2022

Prejudice on parade: Charles R. Knight's paintings and contemporary dioramas of early hominins

Renee M Clary
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Résumé

When hominin remains were recognized as belonging to a prehistoric human species, scientists debated their placement within Darwin's metaphorical "tree of life". These scientific interpretations were publicly communicated through museum displays and their accompanying paleontological art. Charles Knight (1874-1953), the prominent paleoartist of the twentieth century, began his paleontological art career under the mentorship of Henry Fairfield Osborn (1857-1935). In 1920, Knight completed murals for the American Museum of Natural History's Hall of the Age of Man: A Neanderthal family near Le Moustier cave, Cro-Magnon artists painting mammoths in Font-de-Gaume grotto, and a Neolithic community. Knight's depictions were influenced by Osborn, a eugenics supporter, who proposed Australian Aboriginal models for Knight's Neanderthals, and lighter skin colorations for Cro-Magnons and Neolithic humans. In 1926, Knight accepted a large commission at Chicago's Field Museum. The following year, he was able to visit the paleolithic sites he had previously painted. Sponsored by anthropologist Henry Field (1902-1986), Knight and his family toured early hominin sites in France and Spain, and Knight painted background landscapes of some of these sites for Field. Renowned archaeologist Abbé Henri Breuil guided his trip, which had a lasting impact on Knight. Although Knight did not paint prehistoric humans for the Field Museum, Henry Field spearheaded the construction of dioramas featuring early humans for his museum. Both Knight's murals and the Field Museum dioramas illustrated a wide chasm between Neanderthals and Cro-Magnons, a misconception more pronounced after genomic sequencing revealed H. neanderthalensis and H. sapiens interbred. While Knight's cave art illustrations evolved, his hominin stereotypes continued. He persisted in describing Neanderthals as "squat, grotesque, savage" and Cro-Magnons as "tall, intelligent, splendid".
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hal-04424002 , version 1 (29-01-2024)

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  • HAL Id : hal-04424002 , version 1

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Renee M Clary. Prejudice on parade: Charles R. Knight's paintings and contemporary dioramas of early hominins. Travaux du Comité français d'Histoire de la Géologie, 2022, 3ème série (tome 36 bis), pp.47-58. ⟨hal-04424002⟩
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