Rock Art and Cave Paintings at the USU Museum of Anthropology

Fall semester 2012 has begun at Utah State University and the Museum of Anthropology kicks off its Saturdays at the Museum series Sept. 1, with a look at rock art and cave paintings.

Guests are invited to join the museum staff to delve into the mysterious world of rock art and cave paintings during the Saturday activity. Visitors can learn about rock art from Utah and around the world and the process through which the art has been created over the last 30,000 years.

The museum’s young visitors can make their own rock art from 10 a.m. until 4 p.m., and special screenings of Werner Herzog’s film Cave of Forgotten Dreams will show at noon and 1:30 p.m. The film offers viewers a glimpse of some of the oldest rock art in the world in Chauvet Cave in France.

“I think people find rock art and cave paintings so interesting because it ties us to our ancestors,” said Elizabeth Sutton, museum curator. “We see the world through the eyes of people who lived thousands of years before us. We can never know what these people were thinking, but we can see how they expressed themselves and the images that were meaningful to them.”

In addition to the Saturdays at the Museum activity series, community members and USU students alike can visit the museum during its standard operating hours, Monday through Friday, 8 a.m.-5 p.m. Saturday hours are 10 a.m.-4 p.m.

Funding for the Saturday events is provided by a grant from the United States Institute of Museum and Library Services. More information about the IMLS is available online.

The USU Museum of Anthropology is on the USU campus in the south turret of the historic Old Main building, Room 252. Admission is free. For Saturday activities, free parking is available in the adjacent lot, south of the building.

For more information about museum events, call museum staff at (435) 797-7545 or visit the museum website.

The Museum of Anthropology is part of the Anthropology Program at USU in the College of Humanities and Social Sciences.

Related links:

• USU Anthropology Program
• USU Department of Sociology, Social Work and Anthropology
• USU College of Humanities and Social Sciences

Source: Museum of Anthropology

Contact: USU Museum of Anthropology, (435) 797-7545, anthro.museum@usu.edu