Meditationen an Zweiseitern
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Abstract:
The biface (handaxe) speaks directly to our artistic sensibilities. Their beauty is now also being noticed in paleoanthropological research. Nevertheless, these artifacts, which were carved over a period of approximately 2 million years, are often interpreted exclusively as tools or de-
vices, in keeping with the technomorphic attitude of our time. This presentation, on the other hand, develops its questions about this tradition from the premise that the human consciousness of that time was significantly different – and reports on it in three thematic complexes. Bifaces at various sites in Africa, the Near East and Europe are located, described and
questioned. It is not the production of optimally crafted workpieces according to an intentional design, but rather human history's early awakening awareness of the dimensions of space
through haptic implementation, i.e. the development of spatial imagination, that makes the long-standing handaxe tradition understandable. The sharpness of the carefully crafted hand-axe edges, which prove to be impractical when used as a tool, is a congealed experience of linearity. The conscious state of early man when he turns to the stone corresponds to the child's world of experience when producing its scribble drawings. Tracing the development of these
drawings reveals that the child's hand is guided by a deep psychological, body-connected sense of existence, which brings the steps of physical maturation to fruition. Towards the end of the preschool period, the entire human form finally appears in its naturalistic form. In a comparable way, in the earliest period of manual dexterity, our ancestors were able to
identify with their worked article, the biface. This represents the human form itself, still without any naturalism, but with a clairvoyant perception of its own being. In the bifaces we have the
auric self-portrayal of early humans.
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