Colour and Light in Ancient and Medieval Art

Chloë N. Duckworth, Anne E. Sassin

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• ISBN:
  9781351682961
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Arte
• Subtopic: Teoría y crítica del arte

The myriad ways in which colour and light have been adapted and applied in the art, architecture, and material culture of past societies is the focus of this interdisciplinary volume. Light and colour's iconographic, economic, and socio-cultural implications are considered by established and emerging scholars including art historians, archaeologists, and conservators, who address the variety of human experience of these sensory phenomena. In today's world it is the norm for humans to be surrounded by strong, artificial colours, and even to see colour as perhaps an inessential or surface property of the objects around us. Similarly, electric lighting has provided the power and ability to illuminate and manipulate environments in increasingly unprecedented ways. In the context of such a saturated experience, it becomes difficult to identify what is universal, and what is culturally specific about the human experience of light and colour. Failing to do so, however, hinders the capacity to approach how they were experienced by people of centuries past. By means of case studies spanning a broad historical and geographical context and covering such diverse themes as architecture, cave art, the invention of metallurgy, and medieval manuscript illumination, the contributors to this volume provide an up-to-date discussion of these themes from a uniquely interdisciplinary perspective. The papers range in scope from the meaning of colour in European prehistoric art to the technical art of the glazed tiles of the Shah mosque in Isfahan. Their aim is to explore a multifarious range of evidence and to evaluate and illuminate what is a truly enigmatic topic in the history of art and visual culture.

1 Symbolic use of colour in Easter Island (Rapa Nui) in its Polynesian context¹

David Govantes-Edwards

This chapter explores the symbolic, political and ideological value of colour, and more specifically, red, in pre-contact Rapa Nui. It explores the use (and avoidance) of red stone in semantic architecture – the world-famous ahu, moai and pukao – as a possible reflection of the socio-political order of Rapa Nui. Stone carving was an axial activity for the Rapanui value system, and probably also for the political and territorial organisation of the island, and the role played in it by the careful codification of stone types of different colours accordingly matches that found in other forms of expression, such as headgear, tattooing and body painting. The paper shows that the meaning of colour was deeply inset in the island’s ideology, that the brusque changes that led to the end of the so-called moai phase and the apparently radical transformation of the prevalent social system did not transform the value of colour which stands, in fact, as a solid argument for a considerable degree of continuity in the social fabric of Rapa Nui.

Rapa Nui lies at the easternmost tip of the Polynesian Triangle. At a distance of 2,250 miles from South America and of over 1,300 from the nearest inhabited land (Pitcairn), it is the most isolated point of human habitation in the world. Despite its remoteness and its miniscule size (66 sqm), the island has received much attention from scholars and the public alike for the sheer scale of its cultural achievements during prehistory (which, for Rapa Nui, ends in 1722 with the first European contact). Its gigantic stone busts (moai) and other monuments have captured the imagination of the world for generations. Rapa Nui is triangular in shape, each corner presided over by a volcano (Rano Kao, Terevaka and Poike) that commands outstanding views over the largely treeless landscape below. The coasts are dominated by rocky cliffs, sometimes forming vertical drops of hundreds of feet straight into the sea, for example on the western side of Rano Kau. Beaches are scarce and small (See Figure 1.1 in colour plates).

In this chapter, I shall try to illustrate some aspects of colour symbolism during the island’s prehistory (the pre-contact phase) and history (post-contact). This chapter will not present a large amount of new evidence, but colour and the role it played in the island’s prehistory will be reviewed, and some new interpretations will be put forth. It is to be hoped that those familiar with the prehistory of the island find these alluring, and that those who are not, will find this chapter a valuable introduction to the fascinating past of Rapa Nui. I shall touch upon a variety of topics, from the uses given to different types of stone to the cultural concomitance between tattooing and rock carving. The first section will deal with the red stone quarried from the Puna Pau crater, the use and, crucially, avoidance of which is reflective of the socio-political value of the colour red in Rapa Nui; the following section will elaborate on the idea that these symbolic meanings cannot be seen in isolation, that the value of the sensory qualities of materials can only be fully understood when they are considered in combination with other elements, such as access to resources and the organisation of labour; the third section will focus on the relationship between tattooing and rock carving; and finally, I shall argue that colour symbolism was a relatively robust cultural manifestation, and that it was one of the cultural traits that carried through what appears to have been a critical transformation of Rapanui society. Societies can change, often radically, but seldom so radically that they become unrecognisable for their inhabitants.

I hope to be able to show that Easter Island presents a robust albeit culturally specific example of the integrated use of colour into a whole construction of meaning in which multiple strands of the everyday and the sublime are interwoven.

For the archaeologist, Rapa Nui is not an easy nut to crack. Evidence-related problems are, apparently, endless and disarming. For one, reaching a consensus on the chronology of the cultural sequence is proving to be extremely difficult, a problem that affects Pacific archaeology in general. The number of identified sites is bewildering, and the chronological relationships between them are nearly impossible to determine. Stylistic-based seriation of petroglyphs and monuments remains highly problematic (Love, 1993, 104; Skølsvold 1993, 94), and chronometric techniques (radiocarbon and obsidian hydration) lack sufficient precision for the island’s relatively short cultural sequence. In a very broad outline, the prehistory of Rapa Nui can be divided into three stages. The first phase runs from initial settlement (for which dates as disparate as 300 and 1200 CE have been proposed) and the construction of the earliest ceremonial platforms; second, a phase most easily characterised by the construction of ahu (monumental, ceremonial platforms, sometimes used for moai) and the carving of moai, often called moai-phase; and third, a phase which saw the end of monumental construction, the emergence of the ‘Birdman’ cult and the arrival of the earliest European visitors to the island in 1722 (see Mulrooney et al. 2009).

Concerning the ethnological evidence, while some authors, for example Van Tilburg (1994), give considerable credit to the information collected by the earliest archaeologists and ethnographers who visited the island, notably Routledge (1919) and Métraux (1940), others consider that this information is of little historiographical value (Flenley and Bahn 2003; Martinsson-Wallin 1994). Indeed, Métraux (1940, 33) himself claimed, ‘I know of very few places in the Pacific where so little remains of the ancient culture.’ Personally, I tend to side with the sceptics, albeit with qualifications. While I would argue that 20th-century accounts of specific, remote, events (for example, the arrival of Hotu Matua, first king of Rapa Nui) fall into the realm of mythology and should be paid little heed as historical evidence,² insights into general symbolic or ideological principles which may well have been passed down the generational line can be made use of with a little exegesis and common sense. In this regard, a certain degree of coherence with the eastern Polynesian cultural milieu is to be expected and can provide a convenient comparator. I am here operating under the assumption that the Rapanui are Polynesian both in origin and culture, a safe assumption to make once Thor Heyerdahl’s stubbornly defended theory of the South American influence has succumbed under the unimpeachable weight of the evidence; see Flenley and Bahn (2003) for a comprehensive argument against Heyerdahl’s fragile but well-publicised views.

The red scoria of Puna Pau

Regarding colour symbolism, certain parallels are obvious. In Eastern Polynesia, the colour red is consistently imbued with a prominent symbolic meaning. Mana, a concept that can be broadly equated with ‘sacredness’, and also the source of life, was often associated with this colour (Lee 1992, 186). The semantic connection red/blood/life makes frequent appearances in very different cultural and chronological horizons from the Upper Palaeolithic onwards. In fact, red is, along with white and black, the only colour for which all human languages have a specific term (Taçon 1999, 120). This is not to say that the meaning of the red colour is identical in every case. Symbols are polysemic. Yet metaphors which are based on a material reality are not arbitrary (Jones and MacGregor 2002, 8; 11). In this sense, in Eastern Polynesia blood was the substance that allowed the exchange between the world of light (ao), where human beings live, and the world of darkness (po), where the spirits dwell (Gell 1993, 133). Political and religious authority – the abodes of those with more mana, the necessary intermediaries between the po and the ao – was therefore frequently expressed in material symbols of power in which red stood out prominently. For example, red feather cloaks in Hawai’i, and the colour of Tahakai, the mythical princely Mangarevan hero (Earle 1990, 78; Gell 1993, 233).

In line with this Polynesian context, the colour red plays a crucial role in Rapa Nui symbolism. Perhaps the most spectacular manifestation of the importance of red for the Rapanui during prehistory is the use of red scoria stone in monumental architecture. There are several sources of volcanic red scoria on the island, most of which were exploited to a greater or a lesser extent (Seager Thomas 2014, 96–97; Hamilton et al. 2011, 174–5). Among these, however, the quarry of Puna Pau represents like no other the true symbolic power of the colour red for the ancient Rapanui. While other red scoriae were used only locally and with less discrimination, Puna Pau was the chosen source for all the pukao, the top-knots that crowned a number of moai all over the island, and the facia that decorated some of the largest ahu (See Figure 1.2 in colour plates). Crucially, Puna Pau red scoria was very rarely used for anything else, and is essentially absent from non-ceremonial architecture except for a number of isolated instances of later reuse. A parallel may be found in Hivaoa, in the Marquesas, where red scoria from the quarry of Teohopuau was exclusively used for the carving of tiki and ma’ae (Seager Thomas 2014, 95, 101; Van Tilburg 1994, 140).

Why was Puna Pau so special? Two factors combined to make it one of the central places of Rapanui ideology. First, it was a volcano. In ancient Polynesia, volcanoes (along with caves) were regarded as points of contact between the ao and the po (see above) (Richards et al. 2011, 205); places where the separation between the world of the spirits and that of men was punctured, and the two planes of reality could touch one another. They were charged, therefore, with enormous tapu, the situation of spiritual tension or danger that engulfs mortals who are in contact with the occult (Croucher and Richards 2014, 212; Shore 1989, 164). Second, the rock is a vivid red colour, the colour of kings and gods, of political and moral authority. The first time one peeps over the edge of the crater in Puna Pau, one is struck by the sharp contrast between the strong red colour of the rock face and the lush vegetation around it (See Figure 1.3 in colour plates).

That reasons other than practicality were considered in the choice of Puna Pau as the source of some of the most symbolically loaded building materials on the island seems clear (Hamilton et al. 2011, 168). Puna Pau scoria is light and easy to work, but also friable and close to impossible to smooth out in the same way that other readily available types of stone in Rapa Nui can be. Furthermore, due to the way the rock is formed, facias are irregular and unpredictable, and not all areas are guaranteed to offer a block large enough for carving a pukao, which can be as large as 2.5 m tall and 2.5 m in diameter (Seager Thomas 2014, 95). The choice must have been driven by the ideological considerations outlined above, but conscious choice it was: ‘[i]n all artistic media on Rapa Nui, the materials chosen to make an object were not randomly selected. They were utilised for the qualities of colour and texture that they brought to the work, but they also had inherent attributes of value and status’ (Van Tilburg 1994, 124).

The special status of Puna Pau scoria in prehistoric Rapa Nui is clear. As previously noted, it was the material used for the pukao and the horizontal facia that crowned some of the ahu. These ceremonial platforms were of paramount importance for the representation of political power on the island. Monuments are a physical and unmistakable manifestation of the prevailing socio-political order; the presence of the ancestors both legitimises and imposes political and spiritual authority (DeMarrais et al. 1996, 19). It is believed that the multiple construction phases attested by the archaeological record reflect conditions of fluid competition for prestige and political prowess (Hamilton et al. 2008, 177–9; Van Tilburg 1994, 78, 81). Pukao and facia, which appear to have been added simultaneously, are a striking addition. Their red colour stands out, in contrast with the yellow-grey moai and the dark grey basalt of the platforms, as a powerful statement (See Figure 1.4 in colour plates) (Seager Thomas 2014, 103). Notably, pukao and facia are features of only particularly large and elaborated platforms (Van Tilburg and Lee 1987, 142).

But what about the other red scoria types on the island? As previously noted, other red scoria sources were also used, perhaps not quite as restrictedly as Puna Pau scoria, but not indiscriminately either. They appear to be used in architecture mostly as recycled or reused blocks, and generally in marginal features. Also, they were used for the carving of a number of so-called ‘aberrant’ moai, which resist classification. Unlike Puna Pau scoria, these pieces did not travel widely across the island (Seager Thomas 2014, 101–5; Hamilton et al. 2011, 174–5),³ probably because their sources lacked Puna Pau’s potent ideological dimension. They were nonetheless given special consideration, and the main reason we can think of is their colour, which can operate as a material metaphor of the blood of the ancestors (Hamilton et al. 2011, 170–1; Jones and MacGregor 2002, 7). The idea that these ‘aberrant’ moai were an early stage in the development of moai statuary has been put forth. According to this idea, after early experiments, red scoria was replaced by the better-suited Rano Raraku tuff, but this ignores ‘the documented significance of the color red as well as the demonstrated use of the material in ideological contexts […] Color symbolism in Polynesia was neither casually employed not arbitrarily rejected’ (Van Tilburg 1986, 24).

What is the meaning of pukao? Unfortunately, this question cannot be answered with certainty, although some informed guesses have been suggested. The connection of the red colour with the gods, royalty and the ancestors seems to points towards some symbol of status, similar to the Hawai’ian red feather helmets, or other form of chiefly headgear. More generally, the notion that these pukao may have had some sort of funerary meaning is quite popular. In the Marquesas, stones are set on the top of the heads of statues which represent dead people, and pukao may have had a very similar symbolism (Rivers 1920, 301). Also, funerary monuments in Rapa Nui are found in association with intentional scatters of hanihani granules or reused blocks (Seelenfreund and Holdaway 2000, 103; Van Tilburg 1994, 100, 104; 1986, 5), which seems to give plausibility to this connection between Puna Pau red scoria and funerary contexts.

A complex interweaving of meaning

In the previous section, I have elaborated upon the restricted use of Puna Pau red scoria, but there is one type of stone that was used with as many, if not more, restrictions. The tuff from the volcanic crater of Rano Raraku was exploited for the carving of most moai, and for the carving of moai alone. Rano Raraku tuff may not be as visually striking as Puna Pau red scoria: its colour is a light cream, almost yellowish, and it changes to a variety of tones with weathering; but its visual qualities were certainly played with in the composition of ahu, where its freshly-quarried, light colour would stand in sharp contrast w...