The Framework for Ochre Experiences (Foes): Towards a Transdisciplinary Perspective on the Earth Material Heritage of Ochre

Abstract

Ochre is a mineral pigment that has been used by humans for more than 300,000 years. It appears in archaeological, historical, and contemporary settings across vast distances of time and space, and increasing evidence shows ochre use by ancestral hominins as well as by certain animal species. Because of its unique behavioral, functional, contextual, and temporal breadth, it is a topic of study from a range of disciplines. There has been considerable debate amongst them; in particular, on which concepts and empirical methods are the most useful in deciphering ancient ochre practices on an individual, societal, or evolutionary level. However, if we want to understand the significance of ochre from a range of perspectives, we first must acknowledge that ochre formation and use involves different processes operating across all these domains simultaneously. The diversity of ways in which humans interact with ochre relies largely on individual backgrounds and experiences, which is often reviewed at an operational level. Here, we offer an ambitious framework to describe and explore the exceptionally broad role of ochre throughout geological, biological, and cultural evolution, titled the Framework for Ochre Experiences (FOES). We use this framework to realize the complex histories, properties, and uses of ochre; not within a specific domain – but of the entire earth-human system, operating from deep time and into the future. To do this, we bring together several voices to promote a reflective and insightful interaction between different types of ochre actors. We believe this experiential and transdisciplinary approach is not only important for improving our understanding of ochre use in the deep past, but also necessary if we are to appreciate, preserve and actively engage with this unique earth-material heritage now and in the future.

1 Introduction

• Elizabeth Velliky, archaeologist

Ochre is a unique material. It came into my life during my bachelor’s degree, where I became fascinated by the cave paintings from the European Upper Paleolithic. I followed this fascination by continuing to a Master of Arts where I examined rock paintings in British Columbia that were created with red ochre, and the possible sources of ochre that were the origins of the pigments used the pictographs. One PhD and postdoc later, I am still studying ochre, albeit on a different continent, in a different period, which both speak to the breadth of ochre in human existence. I have excavated ochre at numerous archaeological sites. I have looked at ochre with my eyes in the landscape, on rock walls, in caves, in my hands, under a microscope. I have measured thousands of pieces diligently, describing their shapes and features, colors, and textures. I have looked at the insides of ochre pieces as they were captured in micromorphological and geological thin sections. I have crushed ochres for various analyses to understand the complexities of their composition and movement across landscapes and across time. I have crushed ochres to create my own “paint” to put on my skin, and to mix with different binders to see which ones worked better than others. I have even eaten ochre to relieve a stomachache, as was suggested to me by someone who does it regularly (it worked). I have seen ochres on ancient shell beads, ivory beads, stones, bones, in hearths and used to create thick ochre surfaces, an archaeological feature in and of itself. I have seen ochre for sale in markets, being used as a paint mixture or colorant by contemporary artists, and as a dye or additive in beauty products being sold on the shelf today. The use of ochre by humans is vast in time, space, and experience. Just as ochre pigments permeate rock walls, bones, and beads, it has permeated many aspects of human life, potentially before our evolution into Homo sapiens sapiens. Ochre pigments form such a part of our identity that it is difficult to disentangle the use of ochre from the human experience.

When publishing aspects of my research on ochre, only about 1% of the written work encompasses what I have physically experienced and witnessed when interacting and engaging with this material. On the one hand, as a researcher, I know that transferring knowledge from the real-world to a paper is limited by the very nature of the prevailing academic discourse, of the scientific strive for “objectivity”. Furthermore, I believe that empirical observations of prehistoric ochre use are vital for establishing robust interpretative frameworks of the past, and thus permitting us to infer what past ochre behaviors were possibly like. On the other hand, I cannot help but think that there is a profound inconsistency in how researchers like myself and how people in general, both in the past and at present, experience(d) ochre and how we share and discuss these experiences amongst ourselves, and I am certainly not the only one. Over the last few years, after publishing several papers on the geochemical properties of ochre, amongst others, there seems to be a fundamental gap between how active ochre actors (i.e., users) engage with ochre, as opposed to how passive ochre actors (academic observers) investigate and report these materials through peer-reviewed dissemination channels. I have asked myself why is this the case?

Due to the nature of the scientific discipline, the only scholarly acceptable results from ochre studies are those that are objective, empirically based, observable and replicable. For these observations to be of archaeological value, they must in turn be contextualized within the larger scope of predefined models of prehistoric human behavior, whether it be subsistence, symbolism, societal and cultural structures, paleoenvironments, or climate. The room for exploring a more varied range of human experiences within these fixed behavioral frameworks can be quite limited, a theme which has been raised and discussed in archaeology already (Sterling 2015; Schneider and Hayes 2020; Atalay 2006; Conkey and Spector 1984; Supernant et al. 2020). One’s interactions with materials, in this case ochre, the emotional engagement and narratives, self-taught and indigenous ochre expressions, the phenomenology of ochre landscapes or the physical preservation and accessibility of geological ochre sources are all examples of ochre-related topics that do not seem to fit the academic standards or expectations of discipline-specific journals. Scientific results are thus primarily read and evaluated by ochre actors that have the same type of background and experiences. As such, we are talking in a restricted, regulated arena with little room for personal experiences, reflections, and expressions.

2 The Limitation of the Current Ochre Discourse

The current academic knowledge production concerning past ochre use is often disconnected from the fact that ochre or pigments are still in use today, and that the full value of prehistoric ochre does not solely rest in its status as a memory-inducing artifact of the past or the present (i.e., a passive ochre perspective). Ethnographic accounts of ochre use in indigenous or descendant communities are frequently reported, but the link between these seemingly authentic communities and our past is usually emphasized more than their link to our contemporary societies in general. This type of asymmetric analytical disconnect also works the other way. Archaeological ochre artifacts can, in theory, also be appreciated and evaluated based on a less scientific, more experiential engagement, rather than only from their historical value or significance. Contemporary artists and children are experts in these types of engagements, not because they relate pigments to their abstract meaning, but because they relate emotional, sensory, and visual appeal to the shapes and color of pigments. Seldom, however, are their experiences, thoughts or perspectives used to enhance that of the scientifically calibrated narrative of ochre use in mainstream discourse.

The authors of this paper believe that the lack of transdisciplinary conversations among different types of ochre actors is limiting the thematic breadth of the current archaeological ochre discourse. There is the intuitive use of ochre by some animals and our earliest ancestors, the intentional use of ochre from the more recent past until today, the perpetual creation and recycling of ochre through geological processes on the planet, and the permeation of color use into numerous aspects of many daily lives in all parts of the world. Many of these aspects are often scientifically acknowledged, yet only by using methods, models, words, and channels that are accepted and understood by very few. In this paper, we argue that many of the disciplinary discussions within archaeology and ethnography have not been able to fully grasp or address the temporal, geological, biological, cognitive, aesthetic, and cultural diversity associated with earth pigment use. We hypothesize that to understand the significance of ochre use in human history and evolution, we first need to acknowledge that ochre formation, acquisition, and use involves different processes operating across all these domains simultaneously.

Art studies, from contemporary to deep time, are answering the call for plurality brought about by the challenges of globalization. Ochre as a substance is more frequently seen as a component or raw material of art rather than a form of art in and of itself. However, we believe ochre has been fundamental in shaping and allowing modern human art and aesthetics to emerge and develop. Moreover, ochre use may well be the longest-lasting human artistic behavior. We engage with the globalization of ochre-use studies in the two directions highlighted in this volume: as a human universal, and as a topic whose research requires cross-cultural and transdisciplinary perspectives. In an effort to explore new ways of “seeing and thinking ochre” we delve into the spectrum of ochre exploitation, from intuitive to intentional, and from passive to active, and examine a diversity of collective and subjective ochre experiences and practices at a planetary level.

The integration of these different approaches into a single framework of ochre experiences, spanning from deep time to the present, allow us to define ochre as a veritable earth material heritage. This framework brings ochre studies into a twenty-first century global perspective, while acknowledging its temporal depth and including all communities of ochre actors. Bringing together diverse entities and levels of ochre experiences may prove instrumental to developing a global deep art history in which “what has been called ‘prehistoric’ may participate in a dialogue with the contemporary” (Kaufmann 2021).

3 Creating an Experiential Ochre Framework

Arguably, the greatest difference between an academic and beyond-academic approach to ochre is the degree of physical and emotional engagement between the actor and the material. While an archaeological researcher might personally engage with the artifacts they study, most scientific reporting remains largely devoid of private or even subjective observations, despite calls for more humanistic and even post-humanistic approaches in archaeology (see Supernant et al. 2020). This mode of ochre experience we refer to as passive because the core of the experience stems from the act of describing, measuring and abstractly analyzing the material. Within the discipline of archaeology, these practices are routinely conducted on assemblages with the sole purpose of scientifically describing, analyzing, and interpreting the materials.

For (non-academic) active ochre actors, their core ochre experience largely starts with a personal initiative, often involving collecting, producing, experimenting, sharing experiences, and exploring materials. It should, however, be emphasized that an academic with passively acquired knowledge of prehistoric ochre use most certainly can also have actively induced ochre experiences, e.g., through experimental archaeology. Similarly, it is not impossible for an engaged artist or knowledgeable citizen to team up with researchers, such as by providing informed, experiential views on the tactile properties of ochre or identifying the location of possible sources.

The challenge is not necessarily the lack of multi- or interdisciplinary communication between active and passive ochre actors – archaeologists and artists routinely engage with descendant communities (and vice versa) for knowledge and experience sharing (e.g., Joyce 2020). The main challenge is discovering how to integrate the breadth and diversity of all types of ochre experiences found within both informal and formal knowledge-producing systems in a transdisciplinary way. Alternative to multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary collaborations, which represent different degrees of cross-thematic, largely scientific collaborations; a transdisciplinary team acknowledges that there are multiple ways of gaining meaningful knowledge of the world. The team may consist of a much broader range of members, with each member contributing their own specific knowledge and experiences in a joint effort to create new conceptual, theoretical, methodological, and translational innovations. Each members’ perspective transcends each other to form a new framework of knowledge, in which the outcome or result is not simplistically predicted based on the individual disciplinary contributions.

In this chapter, instead of reviewing ochre as a research field within and outside of archaeology, we worked towards a transdisciplinary framework, covering a range of ochre experiences, not limited to just the accepted or traditional scientific ones. Through this framework, we firstly aim to highlight the contributions of specific disciplines in ochre research, while simultaneously evaluating their inevitable blind spots and encouraging the expansion of certain thematic foci. We hope the framework will help facilitate people from different disciplines and societal contexts to connect more easily and openly by facilitating a common language and allowing different ochre actors, from artists to scientists, to identify with at least one part of the framework. Our second aim is to map the earth history of ochre from deep time until today as to better appreciate the rich and complex relationship that exists between our physical earth, animals, humans, and the ways in which all these actors experience ochre and each other. This is what we refer to as the collective ochre experience.

We acknowledge that our attempt to create a transdisciplinary collective ochre framework is highly ambitious, and we therefore explicitly state that it should only be viewed as a thinking tool. That is, we have attempted to account for a wide array of possible interactions and different participants involving ochre materials, but we do not regard it to be exhaustive, final, or universally valid. Our largest obstacle while making the framework was to overcome the anthrocentric perspective that ochre is primarily a human construct: for example, the formation of ochre by geological processes happens regardless of whether humans collect and manipulate the end-product. Furthermore, animals, such as bearded vultures, use ochre (Margalida et al. 2019; Tributsch 2016) and bacterial life forms create useable ochre (Hashimoto et al. 2012) independent of human influence. We also consider the scope of time – ochre creation by geological processes occurred before any hominin species sought to acquire it, and its geological existence will outlive our lineage. The framework, as we currently present it, includes ochre experiences taking place in deep time, the recent past, the present and the future.

4 The Framework of Ochre Experiences (FOES)

With the purpose of articulating and visualizing the variety of ochre experiences on earth, we created the Framework of Ochre Experiences (FOES) shown in Fig. 8.1. The framework is formed by the ochre actors (those directly or indirectly interacting with ochre) and ochre practices (the actions defining the relationship between the ochre and the actors). The framework is divided into four quadrates and encircled by the round earth. This circle encompasses the geodiversity of ochre, or the cycle of ochre creation, from formation in primary contexts, to weathering and transportation, to redeposition and formation of secondary deposits, which are perpetually ongoing. It portrays the notion that iron oxide-bearing materials on this planet exist even if humans or other animals do not. It also encapsulates chemotropic bacteria that produce iron oxides, such as the genera Leptothrix and Gallionella (Hashimoto et al. 2012; Kunoh et al. 2015).

Fig. 8.1

The Framework of Ochre Experiences (FOES)

Contained within the earth-ochre-cycle are the ochre actors and their respective practices or activities. The actors’ general mode is described as either active or passive, and their specific activities are described as either undefined or defined. A summary of each of these roles, their respective time depths, and the types of ochre users contained within them are outlined in Fig. 8.2. We outline each of the types of actors and activities in more detail in the following sections.

Fig. 8.2

Summary of roles and descriptions of these within the OEM. Photo credits, from left to right, are as follows: image by A. Socha, photo by M. Kucharczyk, photo by E. Velliky (author), photo by E. Velliky (author)

4.1 Active and Undefined: The Intuitive Ochre Actor

The Active and Undefined role describes the intuitive ochre actor whose intentions of use are evident but neither the action or the material involved has been consciously or abstractly defined (e.g., in terms of language or concepts). We recognized this as a category when considering the use of ochre by certain animal species, such as the ochre-rich mud bathing elephants in Tsavo National Park (Fig. 8.2), the bearded vulture engaging in ochre baths (Margalida et al. 2019; Tributsch 2016), or the alteration of ochres by plants, lichen, fungi, insects, and invertebrates, to name a few. While we do not fully know the specific drivers or motives, if any, behind their behaviors, their use of ochre is not random but based on actions whether driven by pure intuition (in the case of bacteria or fungi, for example) or intuitive choice (in the case of bearded vultures). Our lack of understanding these activities/actions is most likely a reflection of our own limited knowledge, rather than the complete absence of intentionality or forethought behind some of these actions. Hence, we use the term intuitive to account for the awareness of these ochre actors, even though we are limited in our interpretations of these behaviors.

In considering the hominin record, we ascribe the intuitive ochre role to possible behaviors prior to ca. 300 kya (kya = thousands of years ago). From around this time there seems to be a gradual yet notable increase in direct evidence for ochre use as found at archaeological sites in both Africa and Europe (Barham 2002; de Lumley 1966; McBrearty 2001; Roebroeks et al. 2012; Van Peer et al. 2003). We define direct evidence for ochre use as the presence of anthropogenic use-traces or modifications found on the surface of ochre pieces, suggesting intentions beyond that of intuitive or opportunistic use. The reports of ochre materials from contexts older than 300 kya generally describe much smaller assemblages with either no or questionable evidence of direct modification or a lack of assured stratigraphic provenience (Brooks et al. 2018; Chavaillon and Berthelet 2004; McBrearty and Tryon 2006; Watts et al. 2016). However, the absence of direct modification evidence does not necessarily constitute evidence of the absence of abstractly defined, behavioral intent. Ochre was indeed intentionally collected and transported by archaic hominins, which very well could have resulted in several intangible practices, which are indiscernible archaeologically speaking. We envision that the physical evidence for the transition from intuitive to defined ochre use may be mosaic, lacking, or, in any event, difficult to recognize; effectively limiting our ability to map and understand the development from the one to the other.

4.2 Active and Defined: The Cognizant Ochre Actor

The Active and Defined role describes the cognizant ochre actor whose intentions were/are known and can be partially identified by us today. The cognizant actor has adopted both a physical and abstract awareness of ochre and its properties, and it is this awareness that informs the intentions and frequency of use. From a timeline perspective, we envision that one example of cognizant ochre use began after 300 kya, where modified archaeological ochre contexts are encountered more frequently with the emergence of the African Middle Stone Age (Henshilwood et al. 2009; Hodgskiss 2013, 2020; Rosso et al. 2016; Watts 2009, 2010).

This example of the cognizant ochre actor could therefore be viewed as a (modern) human ochre user with the behavioral complexity and depth that is associated with our species (and with likely closely related hominin ancestors, as well). From our perspective on prehistory, ochre appears to have been primarily processed by early humans for its pigment powder, yet many unmodified nodules are also found from similar contexts (Hodgskiss 2013; McGrath 2020; Nivens 2020; Rosso et al. 2017; Salomon 2009; Velliky et al. 2018; Watts 2009). Residues of ochre are also reported on a range of artifact types including shell, bone and ivory beads (Bouzouggar et al. 2007; Cristiani et al. 2014; d’Errico et al. 2005; Velliky et al. 2021), bone tools (Henshilwood et al. 2001), lithics (Henshilwood et al. 2018; Villa et al. 2015; Wojcieszak and Wadley 2018), ceramics (Capel et al. 2006; Eiselt et al. 2019) and most notably, on cave and rock walls (Aubert et al. 2014; Chauvet et al. 1996; Cuenca-Solana et al. 2016; Iriarte et al. 2009). Ochre was used relatively consistently from the prehistoric past until contemporary times, where ochre is present in a number of different settings, including in various indigenous and descendant communities as a symbolic or medicinal item (Abrahams 2010; Rifkin 2015; Russell 1993; Taçon 2004; Velo 1984), as a “paint” for contemporary art (see contributions below), as an industrial pigment (Kokins and Kostjukovs 2017; Prim et al. 2011), as a component in steel production, and as a colorant in cosmetics, to name a few.

Outside of prehistoric contexts, these cognizant ochre actors also include, but are not limited to, artists, people using it in religious or cultural ceremonies, industrial workers, engineers, and chemists, and museum workers in various capacities. Though the use of ochre is often discussed solely in relation to its role in the past, this is misleading as its use has never ceased and is used in a wide range of practices today.

4.3 Passive and Defined: The Observant Ochre Actor

The Passive and Defined role describes the observant ochre actor who can monitor, measure, or indirectly infer the intentions ascribed to defined and undefined ochre-related practices, but they are not direct agents in these actions themselves. As such, the framework attempts to differentiate between a first degree of ochre use (e.g., direct use in communication, painting/coloring, social signaling or other symbolic practices) and second (meta) degree of ochre actions (e.g., observing, measuring, reporting, mapping of first-degree ochre behaviors). In other words, observant actors are those who can abstractly reflect on (or at a minimum perceive) either active or passive forms of ochre use, or both. Also characteristic for many observant ochre actors is their ability to sort and catalogue the physical properties of ochre materials (texture, composition, size, color, source location, distribution) without necessarily considering their behavioral implications. Examples of these types of observant ochre actors are geologists, biologists, chemists, archaeologists, ethnographers, art historians and various other researchers engaged in understanding the material properties of ochre or the ways in which other actors use or interact with it.

The observant role is ascribed to researchers because they normally seek to understand the properties and complexities of ochre and its associated practices without actively altering or using the materials for another purpose or behavior. It is worth noting, however, that the time depth of the observant ochre actor is likely contemporary to that of the cognizant ochre actor. From an early human or hominin perspective, observant ochre actors would refer to individuals who perceive ochre being used and perhaps understand the message that it conveys, but without directly using the ochre themselves. An example of this is seen in certain indigenous contexts, where ochre was worn as a body paint in specific styles or patterns only on certain occasions (Grosse 1894). This coded, time- and event-specific message was then seen and understood by those who were observing the actor wearing ochre, either as a pigment directly applied or as part of a paint mixture compound. However, as with the intuitive ochre role, it is problematic to give a temporal estimate of when observant ochre practices began, as some of these currently lie outside of the boundaries of what we have direct evidence for or what we know of the direct evidence to be. Indeed, one could argue that the ochre-using bearded vultures (Margalida et al. 2019) are also able to observe those with ochre-stained feathers and those without, perhaps conveying meanings and behavioral implications that we cannot decode.

4.4 Passive and Undefined: Unaware Ochre Use

The passive and undefined role describes those circumstances where one is not currently aware of the ochre behavior and intention. Included in this category are most present-day humans and animals, who either do not know about or interact with ochre in any way. We propose that this role is the starting point for all ochre experiences, and from a temporal perspective, it is also the most long-lasting situation, considering the vast absence of ochre amongst most of our hominin ancestors.

However, this role, like the others, is not fixed, as many once unaware actors can become cognizant or observant ochre actors. This is notable with museum visitors or workshop participants who had no prior knowledge of ochre and its uses before engaging in programs that encourage physical or knowledge-based interactions with ochre. During this transformation, unaware participants become observant actors, or even cognizant and aware ochre actors. This scenario is also applicable to the past, where it is probable that certain groups with no ochre practices encountered those with, and were thus transformed into observant actors, and possibly beyond. Indeed, some level of this transformation likely occurred throughout the migration of hominins out of Africa, given the occurrence of ochre materials at the earliest archaeological sites associated with anatomically modern humans outside of the African continent (Hublin et al. 2020; Hovers et al. 2003; de Lumley et al. 2016).

5 The Function of the FOES: An Ongoing Transdisciplinary Discussion

The FOES was developed through a transdisciplinary process involving discussions amongst both cognizant and observant ochre actors, including contemporary ochre-based artists and writers, a geoarchaeologist, a museum curator and archaeologist, a cognitive archaeologist and an archaeometrist. We consider the process of formulating the framework to be as important as its end function. Therefore, we created a set of basic questions for ourselves to consider, which we designed to highlight the variety of experiences, perspectives, and knowledge amongst us. These questions are:

• 1. How do you define ochre?

• 2. What are your ochre experiences, and how has this informed your current (disciplinary) perspective?

• 3. How do you normally interact with ochre, and why?

• 4. Which ochre actors do you actively relate to? Which ones have you worked with, which have you never worked with? Which would you like to collaborate with and why?

• 5. How do you think your unique knowledge and experience with ochre can contribute to the continued activation and preservation of this unique earth material heritage, in the past, now and in the future?

The first question establishes our initial, intuitive, basic understanding of ochre, with the purpose of grounding a transdisciplinary discussion within each of our personal starting viewpoints. The second question explores how these viewpoints may have arisen, and to demonstrate that our perspectives are most likely limited to our individual experiences. The third question is more specific and meant to showcase how different knowledge systems can produce a variety of observations that may be equally valid and meaningful. Taking the first three questions into consideration, the fourth question challenges us to bridge our knowledge systems and experiential gaps to promote unconventional collaboration, curiosity, exploration, and to push our personal and academic boundaries. The final question encourages us to think of specific, hands-on initiatives, plans or outputs that can be used to encourage a transdisciplinary approach to ochre use, not just for the sake of the ochre actors, but for the sake of celebrating and protecting its unique role as earth material heritage that makes our world more biologically, geologically, culturally, and historically diverse.

6 Through the Eyes of the Ochre Actors: Thematic Reflections on the FOES

6.1 The Observers – Archaeologists, Scientists and Museum Specialists

6.1.1 Tammy Hodgskiss – Museum Curator, Archaeologist

I use the term “ochre” as an umbrella term used to describe a range of geological materials that leave colored streaks, mostly reds, oranges, yellows, or purples. They are composed primarily of iron oxides (hematite, Fe2O3) and iron oxyhydroxides (goethite, FeOOH (Cornell and Schwertmann 2003). The category includes shale, hematite, ferricrete, limonite, mudstone, siltstone, earthy sandstones, specularite and many others.

I discovered ochre through the ancient uses of it. This meant that my initial interaction with ochre was through science – a perspective of looking at the evidence, weighing the facts, testing hypotheses, and drawing conclusions. It was about black and white (or, more appropriately, red, and yellow). But human nature isn’t that easy to define, and ochre as a material is incredibly versatile. Then to add to the mix the uncertainties about and complexities of the cognitive abilities of early Homo sapiens, and the proverbial water can get muddy. Lyn Wadley guided me through my postgraduate studies and always encouraged me to think of all angles of thought – what we inadvertently assume from archaeological evidence based on our current understandings, versus what the tangible evidence can support and how can it be interpreted with minimal bias. As I learnt more about contemporary, ethnographic, and past ochre applications and started to further appreciate the artistic aspects of ochre use – and the users and artists themselves, I grew to feel quite connected with this material.

My main area of expertise with ochre is the physical analyses of archaeological ochres, using use-trace (use-wear) analysis and experimental methods to inform archaeological interpretations. My archaeological investigations have involved various chemical analyses and my interpretations involve cognitive and behavioral theory, since I have focused on the Middle Stone Age in southern Africa – a period of significant development of our species. For the last few years, I have run public ochre workshops for the Origins Centre Museum. These have led me to interact with the landscapes to find ochre sources – an important part of the ochre use process, which I had not thought about much before.

My role within the FOES started as a Middle Stone Age researcher, and the actors I related with were other Middle Stone Age researchers and archaeologists. I started as a passive observer largely, studying early modern Homo sapiens material culture. Interaction with other actors was also mostly defined passive – other archaeologists studying ochre and trying to understand the past human experience. Ethnographic studies and understanding contemporary uses of ochre allowed me to interact with others, mostly in Africa, who had an active involvement with ochre and who used ochre as s sunscreen, a supplement to ease a sore stomach, during traditional healing training, for paint or for ritual (e.g., Rifkin et al. 2015; Rudner 1982; Watts 1998). This knowledge can enable archaeologists to better understand functional choices and reasoning behind ochre use processes in the past.

As an archaeologist and scientist, I was comfortable working with the solid evidence and reconstructing an understanding of the past from that, mostly passively. As I moved into experimental analyses and later public outreach programs and ochre workshops, I had a more active involvement in ochre – touching, feeling, and experiencing it, so I moved towards a cognizant, active involvement. Experimental archaeology is highly informative, and it has allowed for a deeper understanding of how ochre “behaves”, the best ways of using it for certain tasks and what the conceptual and practical steps are in a process (Hodgskiss 2010; Rifkin et al. 2015; Wadley 2005).

I was skeptical of humanistic interpretations, like the Female Cosmetic Coalition (Watts et al. 2016) as an extreme, or purely ethnographic analogies, which often didn’t seem to be based on the archaeological evidence but are rather just theoretical or subjective. Initially I felt that contemporary art use and understandings of ochre were not necessarily relevant to interpretations of ochre use in the deep past. The museum sector and experimental archaeology allowed me to connect with so many more members of the public, artists, and creatives – all with their own knowledge and experiences about ochre and pigments (many active, defined participants in ochre use, but many also passive observers). These interactions have been important in me gaining a more complete understanding of potential ochre use strategies in archaeological contexts – from use of landscapes and collection (Fig. 8.3d), to processing and how ochre interacts with other cultural materials, such as stone tools, grindstones, rock art paint and paint brushes.

Fig. 8.3

Different modes of ochre experiences through the authors of this paper. Photos are as follows: (a) ochre and pigment workshop by HG; (b) ochre in an archaeological profile by MMH; (c) experimenting with paint at an Origins Centre workshop by TH; (d) collecting ochre samples in South Africa by Karen van Niekerk; (e) painted rock art at Cueva de la Serpiente, Baja California Sur, Mexico by LMS; (f) interacting with Bronze Age petroglyphs in Norway by MMH; (g) Mma Motsei and AG in the Nkwemabala yard, Mochudi, Botswana; (h) beach ochre collection by HG; (i) red oxide woman – Mochibidu on Kgale Hill, Botswana by AG

Different perspectives offer insight, and both passive and active interaction with ochre can help inform how it was used in the past. These insights are important in ochre research when dealing with a material that has such a wide range of potential applications. Increased understanding of how different types of ochre can be (or may have been) collected, processed, and manipulated, allows for a potentially deeper understanding of its use through time.

Academically, my work could improve by collaborating with actors who know the cognitive and emotional processes involved in ochre use – or how to ‘see’ those processes. Collaborations with actors who use ochre in their everyday life, especially using traditional methods, would greatly advance my understanding of the material. This should be done not with the intention of drawing connections between ‘traditional’ uses by modern societies and uses in the deep past by early modern humans (Pargeter et al. 2016), but rather with the intention of developing a greater understanding of the interaction between humans and ochre, and the different ways and reasons ochre may be used.

Personally, and for public outreach, I would like to be able to portray a fuller ochre experience to the public. Ochre offers a great meeting place for science (archaeology, chemistry, theory) and art. Museum content must be understandable and meaningful on different levels and for all age groups (Fig. 8.3c). For example, it is easier to visually portray the uses of ochre as an ingredient in paint for rock art than it is to portray that the red ochre residues found on a 60,000-year-old stone tool may have been added to resins to haft tools (Wojcieszak and Wadley 2018), but both are significant features of our human journey. The process of allowing actors to become active and cognizant participants in the ochre experience, and therefore in the past, can bring about a shared memory and shared feelings of what the landscape can provide for us, and how our ancient ancestors created with it.

6.1.2 Larissa Mendoza Straffon – Cognitive Archaeologist

The term ochre to me invokes the deep historical relationship between humans and color, and the color red in particular. There are several naturally occurring minerals that may be used for pigment production such as gypsum and kaolin (white), charcoal and manganese dioxide (black). However, red ochre seems to have been preferably exploited by our species since very early on (Watts 2009), which is intriguing in and of itself and requires an explanation.

I first came across the ancient cultural applications of ochre during my study of the Great Mural rock art of Baja California (Fig. 8.3e) one of the oldest dated art traditions in the Americas (Viñas-Vallverdú et al. 2021). Later, my research interest in the origins of visual art and aesthetics invariably led me to encounter ochre as a protagonist.

While reviewing the possible earliest aesthetic practices displayed by humans, it soon became clear that the use of red-color minerals was deeply rooted in Homo sapiens cognition and behavior. Seemingly, the exploitation of ochre was occasionally practiced by African hominins preceding the emergence of our species (Watts 1999) whose oldest fossils are now dated to about 300 kya (Hublin et al. 2017). However, after the appearance of H. sapiens, there is a clear increase in the use of large quantities of iron-oxide minerals (Barham 1998; McBrearty and Brooks 2000) and by 140 kya the presence of ochre is the third most frequent material find in many modern human sites in Africa, behind lithics and animal bones (Watts 2009; Wolf et al. 2018).

The key question is what were these early humans doing with red pigment? What uses and contexts can we infer from the archaeological record of ochre? The evidence of pigment use may be considered ambiguous in that we are normally presented only with traces of ochre processing, or just the raw material itself, with little clues as to what it was applied to or for (d’Errico et al. 2012). Some intrinsic visual qualities of red ochre may explain why it was preferred over other color minerals. The saliency of red in human attention has been confirmed in studies with young children (Franklin et al. 2008) and adults from different cultural backgrounds (Elliot et al. 2013). Biased attention towards red may be rooted in evolutionary selective pressures for color vision in primates related to the detection of fruit patches at long distances (Dominy et al. 2003).

The recurrent presence of red ochre in early funerary contexts around the globe furthermore points towards its probable importance in ritual activity (Bowler et al. 2003; Hovers et al. 2003). For instance, red ochre is the most recurrent cultural material in Upper Palaeolithic burials across Europe (Martínez González and Straffon 2017). This suggests that the intrinsic visual qualities of ochre may account for human perceptual- aesthetic biases for the color red due to its potential emotional associations with blood, and concepts like life and death (Watts et al. 2016; Wreschner et al. 1980).

The attentional bias for the color red likely coevolved with human sensory and cognitive systems, in an environment that allowed this color to be perceived as salient (Johnstone 1997). H. sapiens, then, made use of pre-established perceptual capacities and biases to culturally create an effective signaling behavior (Krebs and Dawkins 1984). Gibson’s concept of affordances refers to the perceivable properties that allow organisms to make use of things in the environment (Gibson 1979). In that sense, ochre affords several human behaviors. Its texture and clay-like properties, for instance, allow for skin protection and ingestion for therapeutic purposes. The saliency of ochre minerals also afforded humans the possibility to culturally exploit and use the color red for communication purposes, i.e., as a visual signal to attract and focus conspecific attention to themselves and/or particular objects. Why other hominins did not make use of such an affordance, or not to the same extent as our species, might be related to the evolutionary environment of H. sapiens. Despite the possibility that an attentional bias towards red may be shared with other primates and other members of our lineage, the cultural exploitation of ochre seems more closely associated with us than to any other hominin. Both in Africa and in Europe, the appearance of H. sapiens seems accompanied by an increase in the frequency and quantity of red ochre presence in the archaeological record (Wolf et al. 2018). For this reason, the habitual occurrence of ochre may in fact be considered as a defining trait of our species (Watts 2009). It should not surprise us, perhaps, that the earliest drawings made by modern humans known to date are made from (Henshilwood et al. 2018) and on ochre (d’Errico and Henshilwood 2011).

Within the Framework of Ochre Experiences (FOES) early modern humans probably began applying ochre as intuitive active agents, just like other non-human animals (elephants, antelope, etc.). Members of hominin populations that would eventually give rise to H. sapiens acquired and transmitted ochre use behaviors, perhaps for medicinal or skin protection aims, fine-tuning their perceptive and cognitive systems towards the color red. The earliest members of our species then became cognizant active actors for whom the colorizing properties of ochre minerals afforded them the ability to culturally exploit red as a signal.

What I find special about ochre is that, in human hands, it goes from a natural earth mineral to an active creator in and of the cultural universe. In rock art, ochre allows humans to create and recreate their origin and other myths, to communicate with other realms, record and teach their worldview, and bring generations together across time. When applied to the body, it helps humans to differentiate themselves from other beings, to become people (Turner 2012). So ochre is a fundamental, active agent in and of human culture. To learn about these aspects, we need interdisciplinarity and insights from fields such as anthropology, ethnography, linguistics, art theory, and psychology. As an archaeologist, I am used to seeing ochre as a raw material or as the trace of some past human activity but learning from those other perspectives has helped me see it through the eyes of active ochre-using communities (either traditional groups, artists, researchers, or enthusiasts) as a social player and a creating force. However, I myself have rarely engaged in ochre-use outside of a research-based or observer context.

Conservation is one of the biggest challenges I see related to ochre-based practices. The current rapid extinction of small-scale societies, languages, and traditional ways of life brings with it the loss of a large corpus of human knowledge and cultural diversity. If ochre-based practices fall into disuse, we risk losing a large part of cultural memory, not only related to those particular groups but of humankind in general. As for past practices, ochre that was applied to a surface, for example a rock wall, is fragile. As archaeologists, our research activities and interventions often put at risk the very objects that we are trying to study and protect. Making an ochre source, rock art site, or ancient ochre-covered artifact known can make them vulnerable. On the one hand, having people view these objects can make them want to preserve them; on the other, it can generate damage and vandalism. Therefore, creating public awareness about the importance and fragility of living and past ochre practices and engaging with ochre-using communities is key.

6.1.3 Magnus Mathisen Haaland – Geoarchaeologist

To me, the term ochre refers to a specific type of archaeological material that has been used by humans across the world and throughout our history. Typical examples of ochre artifacts include brightly colored ground pigments (powder) or modified rocks with various use-wear and color properties. In the Middle Stone Age contexts that I investigate, ochre material has been documented in large quantities, yet the contexts in which they occur, their shapes, modifications, color, and geochemical compositions vary significantly through time.

From an early age I was introduced to prehistoric rock art, specifically the red rock carvings found close to the fjords in Norway. As a child, I could easily relate to the inexplicable urge of making shapes and color to express myself. Being told that this was also true for people living in my hometown during the Scandinavian Bronze Age did not come as a great surprise; after all, who does not want to paint a red imprint of their hand once in a while (Fig. 8.3f)? However, it was only much later in life, as an undergraduate student in archaeology, that I learned that rock carvings in Norway had been traced and painted red by modern-day curators to enhance their visibility; a practice that today is discontinued and is currently being reversed at many locations. While my first experience with prehistoric color-use turned out to be a huge deception, it nevertheless encouraged me to become an archaeologist driven by an intense curiosity about prehistoric minds and lifeways: what did people do in the past and why? Today, I study the elusive existence of some of our earliest human ancestors that lived in cave and rock shelters on the tip of southern Africa some 50–100 kya. These people routinely used ochre in their daily lives, yet we still do not fully know why.

As a trained geoarchaeologist, I employ methods to study the physical processes responsible for the creation, build-up and preservation of archaeological sites and contexts. Through my work, I routinely describe the microscopic content of prehistoric occupation deposits using micromorphology and a range of other analytical techniques (Fig. 8.3b). I usually observe and map fragments of bone, charcoal, shellfish, and lithic debris; all which attest to the range of activities that occurred at the prehistoric campsites. Occasionally, I also come across angular, mm-to-cm sized iron-rich fragments of red rocks. To the naked eye, these rock fragments are smaller than a full-stop punctuation mark. Thus, they are often overlooked during conventional excavation and seldom reported. Yet the occurrence and distribution of microscopic ochre fragments within archaeological sediments are behaviorally significant because they do not form or occur there naturally. Consequently, we know that these ochre fragments – though they are small – must have been deposited by prehistoric people, who, for some reasons that we do not fully understand, intentionally collected and transported them back to the cave. The size and shape of the microscopic ochre pigments also suggest that the ochre was heavily processed and ground before it was incorporated into the archaeological deposits.

From a geological point of view, I consider the ochre fragments distributed within archaeological deposits to represent one of many sedimentary constituents from which – in combination with other sedimentary components – a range of natural formation processes can be inferred. From an archaeological point of view, the same ochre fragments also represent miniature archaeological artefacts from which episodes of in-situ past ochre use and behaviors can be inferred. Approaching the microscopic ochre assemblage from both a geogenic and an anthropogenic perspective, while keeping their depositional micro-context intact, allows me to improve the analytical scope of the traditional macroscopic approach.

As a researcher occupied with conducting field-based studies of the remains left by prehistoric groups of people, I represent the observer within the FOES. Throughout most of my academic career, I have primarily collaborated with similar-minded, archaeologically oriented scientists, occupied either with the material science (geology, archaeometry) or the cultural and social science (anthropology, ethnography) of ochre. To some degree, I have worked with understanding the physical, tangible, and tactile aspects of ochre use through pre-designed physical experiments, carried out with the intention of referring to the archaeological material. To a lesser degree, I have worked with the psychological, aesthetic, or cognitive aspects of ochre. Not since I was a child have I used pigments actively in a personally fulfilling, recreational or artistic way.

As an empirically based archaeological researcher, I always find it hard to bridge the analytical gap between the concrete and the abstract, between the singular observation (i.e., an ochre grain) and the implicit intention behind its existence (e.g., symbolism, identity, cosmology, visual satisfaction). Most archaeologists therefore – including myself – comfortably and routinely fall back on an analytical middle ground that often involves the formulation of behavioral processes. For example, inferring the process of paint-making, the process of art making, the process of grinding or scoring, or the process of ochre mining, acquisition, and transportation. While I believe that the systematic and empirical recording of all these processes is vital for our general understanding of past human ochre use, it has become clear to me – through discussions with other types of ochre actors – that it is important to be aware of the limitations that these types of “scientific” narratives provide. The full scope of human ochre experiences stretches far beyond that of mechanical, depositional, or logistical processes that can be inferred from geoarchaeological investigations of occupation deposits.

I envision that the active engagement with ochre actors adhering to knowledge systems different from mine own, for example by emphasizing the phenomenological, psychological, motoric, and sensory effects of pigment use could serve as a valuable, life-enriching, and transdisciplinary mechanism that ultimately may lead to more insightful research and present-day awareness of the relationship between humans, ochre and earth.

6.2 The Active: Artists, Teachers, Ochre Workers

6.2.1 Heidi Gustafson – Artist, Ochre Worker

Ochre, to me, defines a spectrum of geologic material, dominated by the presence of iron and oxygen (laced with other trace elements forming personality or geochemical fingerprint), tied to a specific place, part of an ecological system and that leaves enduring, colorful traces.

I also try to consider ochres across a behavioral and relational spectrum (not simply by color or chemical structure): what are their sensual impressions, textures, saturation, tone, feeling, hardness, binder affinities, mood, and other characteristics? How do they feel in the hand? What kind of marks do they make? What flora and fauna grow with them in their native environment? Highly effective, or more “powerful or spiritual” ochre, by my own definition feels, simply, alive, and vibrant. In that way, I experience ochres as non-human actors, as ancestors and kin, with their own agency or “life force.” I feel ochre is a primal way to better understand and bond with Earth’s creative process and diverse expressions, our own image, story or metaphor, and reflect knowledge about human capacities (and perhaps failures!) as an iron-addicted (i.e., steel), radically terraforming, species.

In retrospect, I first “met” ochre’s influence several times throughout my life without realizing it until much later. It’s hard to know exactly where or how my relationship with ochre began. I was born and grew up next to a swamp, rich in biogenic yellow ochre (ferrihydrite). A few miles away is an Indigenous Duwamish biogenic ochre spring (in now-called North Seattle). My first day as a baby, I spent on the coastal Whidbey Island beach with my grandparents – a beach whose cliffs carry several kinds of ochre clays with red (hematite), yellow (goethite), blue (vivianite), black (magnetite) and many shades of chalky and clayey ochres in between. Unfortunately, as a trained visual and conceptual artist, I never knew or cared about “ochre,” despite it being a primary part of all paint and drawing tools. Oddly, the primary way I was introduced to ochre was through active imagination (or intuitive visualization), then through a powerful dream that acted as a sort of map (to find ochre), and then through sustained relationship with ochre-rich places in the world today.

I started off as an intuitive ochre actor throughout my life. Ochre was a part of the ground I lived on, the artwork I made, make-up I loved and places I’ve been drawn to throughout my life. Now, led by my encounters with ochres themselves I am more often a cognizant ochre participant. Professionally, I still relate to ochres intuitively as an artist, an ochre forager, educator, and archivist. Most importantly, I consider my work akin to an Earth custodian or steward, bringing ochre and people together into a protective, dynamic, sanctuary (or working library) of exchange and connection. Ochre is my way to care about and honor Earth and my cultural heritage as a human.

I work to bring people closer to the creative power of earth places through foraging ochre and working with colorful pigments tied to places that touch them on a personal, often emotional or spiritual, level.

I do this transformation with others in a few ways. I gather and make ochre pigments for people all over the planet (Fig. 8.3a). As a pigment maker, I connect people intimately to ochre in their life and art, to “ochre-engage” them, in pigment form. As an educator, I bring people into geological landscapes, to forage rocks and soil in context (Fig. 8.3h), which provide intimate access to ochre, in a bigger ecological picture and through all of their embodied senses. As an ochre archivist, I collaborate with the whole circle of ochre actors.

Ochre is a particularly powerful material which speaks to Earth’s diversity and inclusion: not only are ochre localities geodiverse (it forms nearly everywhere on Earth in unique ways) and spectrally wide-ranging as pigment (forms several hues across the rainbow!) ochre also influences and encourages diverse forms of creative expression and shared memory in humans. More deeply, when I gather ochre in the landscape, I feel connected to an awareness of integrated Earth places, deep time knowledge, and sense of ecological wonder and responsibility. In particular, because ochre is a shared human aesthetic heritage, or common ground if you will, and available for discovery and use even in unexpected or urban places (sewage, rusty junkyards, rubble, graveyards, landfills, ditches, toxic mine wastes and more), I find that ochre plays a unique role in connecting people to Earth material systems, especially parts we tend to be less informed around, such as so-called “waste” cycles and bigger elemental, sedimentary, geochemical, evolutionary rhythms and experiments on Earth.

Ochre contributes greatly to our creative activity (image-making, communication, expression, display, movement) in the past, and into and beyond the future as we can imagine it. Ochres are a powerful metaphoric material that keep us in touch with Earth’s geodiversity and our own creative diversity. My viewpoint supports people remaining connected and engaged with ochre, thus, staying engaged with many levels of engagement at once: active experience integrated with a deep time material perspective. My sense is that this continues to support the healthy cycling dialogue and vibrant exchange of ecological knowledge shared across individuals, cultures (human and non), deep time and space.

6.2.2 Ann Gollifer – Visual Artist, Writer

Ochre is earth stained over millennia by iron deposits. Its use by humankind has always combined the practical with the spiritual.

I started using ochres in reference to racial stereotypes in my painting practice. This led me to narrow my palette to the earth colors and black and white. The move from the use of commercially produced paints to raw earth pigments was prompted by a visit to The Phuthadikobo Museum in Mochudi, a regional museum located 50 km north of Gaborone (Botswana). There, I saw several pigment cakes on display. Upon enquiry, the museum staff took me to several traditional sites of collection in the landscape of Mochudi village, where I was fortunate to meet a woman still practicing traditional house painting, an art that has almost completely died out in rural Botswana.

I met Mma Motsei Nkwemabala, a muralist/house decorator/painter and healer, in a riverbed where I had been taken by Aobakwe Moroko, an assistant curator from the Phuthadikobo Museum to collect yellow ochre. Mma Motsei was in the process of re-painting a small house in her yard that she intended to use as a space to massage pregnant women. She is a traditional artist and healer, working with women and children. Her husband is a full time Sangoma, or Traditional Healer. The couple welcomed me into their yard to observe the process of making and using the ochres as pigment on external earth walls. She told me that she worked with a wide range of colors and that she could provide me with them. She showed me how she processes the lumps of raw ochre, reducing them to a coarse powder by pounding them in a kika, and how she mixes it with kraal manure to make a thick liquid-paste, which she then uses as a decorative plaster on walls. She gave me permission to make a written record of her talking about the collection and processing of the ochres and I also filmed her plastering the walls of her out-building (Fig. 8.3g). I have been to visit her several times over the last few months, to collect ochres and continue our conversations. I pay her for each color she provides me with, in processed ochre cakes, ground ochre or sometimes in the raw earth state.

I find that when Mma Motsei and I just chat about things in general, we touch on interesting details of knowledge that I would never ask about from my position of cultural ignorance. For example, when she came to my studio, I showed her some of my work using red ochre that we found in a termite mound in a ward of Mochudi called Dichibidu, meaning the ‘red place’. I commented on the purity and intensity of the color. She then told me that the red from the termite mound was sacred and brought good luck. It is used to call the ancestors. I did not ask why, how, when and by whom – that conversation will come later as I learn the best ways to ask these questions. I plan to go on walks with Mma Motsei and her husband who is a traditional healer, to the sites of collection and within this scenario talk about their names and uses of each color.

I have found that processing and painting with the ochres of Botswana has brought me into contact with people who still use them as a significant part of their daily lives. I find that this connection with others in the community still using the ochres gives my own practice a relevance and meaning beyond the personal. While collecting and then working with the ochres, I am continually making discoveries about the individual properties of each color, its vibrance, tone, smell, and consistency. For example, an ox-blood red from Senete is so hard when taken out of the ground that it must be stamped in a wooden kika, as the pounding necessary to reduce it to a powder would destroy a porcelain mortar and pestle. Once reduced to a fine powder, it is soft and smooth and has the most wonderful spreading power as a watercolor. The Senete dark red is so full of iron that it almost smells like blood, while Lobatse deep yellow smells of rain on hot earth, petrichor. I plan to learn as much as I can about the ochres found in Botswana from the people who still use them for cosmetics, sunscreen, paint pigments, as a tool for accessing the spiritual, as well as from traditional healers who might be able to help me better understand the uses and naming of the ochres. I am in the process of cataloguing all the different colors of the ochres that I have obtained and will continue to do so as my ochre journey in Botswana continues.

As a visual artist, my attraction to ochre is both a fascination with its materiality and color properties, and a curiosity about its potency as a spiritual medium in human culture from ancient times to date (Fig. 8.3i). I am constantly in search of relevance within the field of contemporary art, but more importantly I would like to engage with the much wider issue of where we came from, who we are and where we are going. I believe that my associations with ochre researchers, both in observant and cognizant roles, will give me much needed support in the academic field. Their knowledge and insights would be invaluable to my understanding of the relationship between the ochres and human cultural evolution.

The research I carry out comes directly from the interests of a visual artist in terms of practical collection and application. I gain knowledge during collection of ochre, outside in the wider community and within my studio space while working with the pigments. This knowledge helps me build a conceptual framework within which I might contribute visually to the ochre story, making it one that is visible to a wider audience, beyond the scientific and academic. The more we begin to understand and appreciate our home planet and the earth that sustains our lives the closer we might come to preserving it and ourselves.

7 Discussion

7.1 Evaluating the FOES Through the Actors

The experiences of the authors presented in this paper are arguably more diverse than what is usually reported in academic contributions. However, it is important to acknowledge that our compilation of perspectives is still primarily limited to the viewpoint of western-based, largely female actors. Indeed, there are numerous outlooks that have gone unvoiced. It is often useful to reflect on why certain views are represented while others are not. In our case, we recognize that the group of people involved here is partly an opportunistic mix of loosely related academic colleagues, and partly the result of random encounters. However, this does not make our individual viewpoints less valid; yet the lack of cultural, gender, or geographic diversity should certainly be recognized as a factor that may limit transdisciplinary collaboration and outputs. Even so, we hope that our initiative can serve as a starting point for more inclusive and creative dialogue and be inspirational for different actors wanting to engage in similar types of discussions in the future.

The authors’ written accounts describe how each of them initially became aware of, and then gradually became more engaged with, ochre. Though the actors can be thematically divided between observant researchers and cognizant artists, one common underlying thread amongst them is that key human traits such as learning, curiosity, and exploration played a significant role in the development of each actors’ perception of ochre. These traits were involved in how they began, expanded, and nurtured their knowledge of, and interactions with, ochre. While some actors have preferred to gain information through formalized knowledge systems (i.e., laboratory-based material sciences or carefully designed cognitive testing), others have developed their ochre awareness by hiking and foraging in ochre-rich landscapes, through visual experimentation and expressions, through writing and thinking, through spiritual practice or by engaging with museum visitors or indigenous communities.

In their personal accounts, each actor has – in their own way – expressed and elaborated on their fascination of ochre, whether it being its versatile history, visual properties, or simply its capacity to be imbued with an abstract meaning. For archaeologists, their fascination tends to stem from the temporal link that ochre forms between humans today and people of the past, largely through the medium of rock art, but also through the presence of ochre at archaeological sites all over the globe. The fact that ochre can still capture our attention today speaks to the appeal it might have had on our ancestors in the past. For contemporary artists using ochre, their fascination lies both with its tactility and visual quality, but also with the emotional connections that arise from interacting with it, particularly at the intersections between perception and action and between imagining and expressing. For many artists and indigenous groups, the act of collecting ochre from a specific place, within a specific landscape, can create an additional layer of meaning, which then becomes part of the material’s narrative and origin story. Regardless of the individual reasons or processes behind each actor’s ochre experience, there seem to be a universal human desire to engage with this type of material, directly or indirectly, in the past and in the present. Ultimately it is this non-contextualized, ahistorical yet shared attraction that stimulated the creation of the FOES; as map or meeting place that can link and translate the insights gained from all types of ochre experiences, and not just from a few.

7.2 In Light of a Humanistic Approach

While we argue throughout this chapter that ochre experiences are not isolated to “the archaeological past” several of the authors are archaeologists by discipline and thus began their ochre stories within the archaeological past, mounted in (or even constrained by) the scientific discipline that gave rise to their interest in the first place. Discussions surrounding the limiting aspects of archaeology in the pursuit of maintaining objectivity are not new and are generally grounded in feminist and indigenous theoretical critiques (Atalay 2006; Conkey 2005). While these topics are pertinent to the study of ochre in the human past, it is not our goal in this paper to deconstruct the current methods, interpretations, and ultimately the narrative on past ochre use from different theoretic viewpoints. Rather, the stories told in this chapter revealed something wanting in the discipline, of how the strive for objectivity in archaeology does not seem to meet the emotional experiences and perspectives of the individuals engaging with these topics on a regular basis (which indeed has been reflected elsewhere in archaeology, for examples see: Supernant et al. 2020; Pellini 2018). Those who work with ochre (and likely those who work closely with other materials) develop an emotional connection to it in one way or another, whether it be to the material itself or the situations arising from working with it (e.g.: relationships forged from collaborations, excitement or stress stemming from research). These so-called “emotional demands” could be fulfilled in other ways (e.g., working with visitors in museums) but rarely are they shared through academic mediums. This is precisely the issue that we attempt to address and reconcile in this chapter and with the FOES: to provide a space for disciplinary-bound scientists and other ochre actors to speak and share their stories and experiences that are not so openly received or encouraged in other formats, with the intention of encouraging others to do so. Ultimately, the experiences unique to archaeologists could eventually, and collectively, work towards establishing “…an archaeology that took its humanistic goals seriously while not relinquishing its rigor nor its commitments to its audiences that are far more expansive than what one could imagine” (Conkey 2020, 271). Currently, our goal is to push towards this direction through the lens of the collective ochre experience, to express that this material is uniquely situated to tie together different threads of many different experiences and ways of experiencing throughout time and space.

We are, however, aware that these types of grandiose, transdisciplinary visions (crafted largely by western scholars) may be perceived by some as convenient and academically constructed concepts, containing many words but lacking humanized substance. In response to this, we emphasize that ochre is the only material we know of whose use over time, at least in a global and abstract sense, has continued. The multiple uses of and experiences with ochre pigments are one of very few non-biologically necessary human practices directly connected to the development of our species from the beginning of Homo sapiens (and even before) until now. To date, archaeologists have not defined distinct ochre technocomplexes; perhaps because the ways in which humans/animals used and use it is hard to define and allot into technical categories. Instead, it can and often has permeated many aspects of the human experience – artistic, religious, symbolic, medicinal, and practical. The human experience on and of earth is literally and abstractly colored by ochre. As such, it represents a globalized material heritage, rather than a local cultural heritage, because people from widely different places, perspectives, backgrounds, and time periods can all – intuitively and naturally – find common ground in ochre. Thus, we believe that to consider ochre in all its many dimensions is a global approach.

With the variety of ochre experiences explored in this paper, this diversity is not exclusive to our prehistoric ancestors, and by extension to the academics that study them. Ochre is also not a material that belongs only to the historically interested, the creatively gifted or the spiritually engaged. No specific cultural, religious, commercial, or disciplinary group has an exclusive right to define how ochre may or may not be used. The true extent of ochre diversity lies in the fact that this single physical material is uniquely meaningful in all of these spheres of existence simultaneously, from the deep past up to today. In our view, there are no authoritative uses or experiences of ochre, only situational uses and experiences, which are represented equally in sustained lineages of traditional use as well as in the diversity in different living cultures and people today. Acknowledging this can be difficult or uncomfortable because not only does it force us to speak and write less and listen and observe more, but it also challenges our very notion of how earth material knowledge is gained (scientifically, visually, or abstractly) and how to link and validate it.

In this regard, we believe that the FOES can help to overcome some of these translational challenges and thus promote more extensive conversations amongst the collective ochre experience. That being said, if other ochre actors had been co-authors of this contribution, their framework and collaborative process and output would most likely have been quite different. We perceive this as a testament to the complexity of human ochre experiences, and not to the invalidity of our qualitative results. Finally, we believe that developing more transdisciplinary approaches to ochre, particularly those that integrate and activate multiple types of knowledge systems, is not only important for improving our understanding of ochre use in the deep past but is also critically necessary if we are to understand, preserve and actively engage with this unique earth-material heritage in the present and in the future.

8 Conclusion

Ochre is a mineral pigment that has been used by humans for more than 300,000 years. It appears in archaeological, historical, and contemporary settings throughout the world. Because of its unique behavioral, functional, contextual, and temporal breadth, the use and role of ochre in both past and present-day settings has caught the attention of researchers from a range of different disciplines, including archaeology. There has been considerable debate amongst them; in particular, on which concepts, methods and empirical observations are the most useful in deciphering ochre-related behaviors on an individual, societal, or evolutionary level. In this paper, our starting hypothesis was formulated based on the notion that the current scientific ochre discourse, particularly in archaeology, does not fully account for the range of processes involved in the formation, acquisition, and use of ochre materials. For this reason, we have put forward a transdisciplinary ochre framework that we believe has the capacity to define a much greater range of ochre experiences than has been previously reported within the archaeological scientific community. The framework also allows us to better grasp the temporal, physical and abstract relationships between the different types of ochre actors as well as emphasizing the fact that the way humans gain earth material knowledge, and their reasons for doing so, is neither static nor binary.

We co-developed and co-evaluated our framework through the personal ochre accounts of both scientific and non-scientific ochre actors. Their statements highlight the contribution of discipline or perspective, while simultaneously revealing potential blind spots and unreleased collaborative potential. Yet, we do not wish to reduce the significance of our framework simply to a general scientific contribution, or to its functional role in transdisciplinary collaborations specifically. Our ultimate goal is to promote an awareness of the deep-rooted interconnectedness between ochre formation (geological processes), intuitive ochre use (animal behavior), and observant and cognizant ochre use (cultural behavior). We believe this can best be done by emphasizing that fact that the earth material heritage of ochre – from deep time until today – is characterized by complex, non-linear and multidimensional relational field between the physical landscape, the animals that live in it, and humans.

Ochre is a powerful metaphoric material that connects earth’s biological, geological, historical, and cultural diversity. Today, all parts of our earth-animal-human system are in danger of being lost due to the systematic removal of (and humans’ general lack of exposure to) natural and cultural landscapes, intact geological environments, and the accelerated extinction of animal species and their habitats. Increased globalization and urbanization are contributing to the irreversible loss of distinct cultural practices, creative expressions and functional adaptations that are all built on different types of knowledge systems. To counteract this development, we should make a greater effort to emphasize the value of diversity in human material experiences. In terms of people with knowledge of ochre, this means that both observant and cognizant ochre actors ought to recognize their responsibility in joining their skills, perspectives and approaches to foster curiosity, creativity, awareness, sense of ownership and protectiveness of the earth material heritage of ochre.