Big Bang of Art. Modernity meets prehistory

Exhibition at the Hessisches Landesmuseum Darmstadt with works from the rock art collection of the Frobenius Institute for Cultural Anthropological Research at the Goethe University Frankfurt, 24. March – 25 June 2023.

Where is the origin of art? The German anthropologist Leo Frobenius pursued this question at the beginning of the 20th century. Over two dozen expeditions led him and his research teams to the cave paintings of Europe, Africa and Asia. Artists were also part of the expedition teams. They produced over 8,000 painted reproductions of these sensational pictorial worlds, which take us back 30,000 years into the past. They are still in the possession of the Frobenius Institute in Frankfurt am Main today.

The discovery of the cave paintings was a key experience for modern artists. Many were inspired by these primal beginnings of art. They adopted abstract forms of representation and stylistic devices from the rock paintings and were convinced that this would bring them closer to the anthropological core of art. Alfred H. Barr, founding director of the Museum of Modern Art in New York, recognised this connection between modernity and prehistory and exhibited the Frobenius Collection together with works of contemporary art for the first time in 1937.

The ‘Big Bang of Art’ exhibition revisits this artistic dialogue. Around 80 loans allow the rock paintings to enter into a dialogue with works of modern art and forge a link to the art of Joseph Beuys, who described himself as a ‘reborn cave artist’. In addition, works by Joan Miró, Paul Klee, Pablo Picasso, Hans Arp, Willi Baumeister and André Masson are set in relation to the atmospheric cave paintings, including paintings from the Spanish Altamira and from the famous ‘Cave of the Swimmers’ in south-west Egypt.

Photos by Jennifer Markwirth