Good Guy Thesen is currently (’til the end of May ‘09) exhibiting ‘Considering Therianthropes: Animal / Human’ at Knysna Fine Art.  Here’s the interview I did with him, and below my article and some images supplied by Knysna Fine Art:

 1488 - Just One In A Succession Of 165,000 Years Of History For The Eden Region

How does it happen that places sometimes acquire names which foretell discoveries that’ll be made years after the names themselves have become part of our lives?

Take ‘The Garden Route’ and ‘Eden’ for instance.

The Garden Route - the indescribably beautiful seaward side of the Outeniqua Mountains which define South Africa’s Southern Cape Coast - got its name from its beauty, and it’s been called The Garden Route for ages: probably from the time the first settlers came here two and three hundred years ago.

But with the birth of South Africa’s democracy, the Garden Route was politically married to the dramatic, semi-arid region that lies to the landward side of the Outeniquas - the Klein Karoo. The new entity - or District Municipality - was called ‘Eden’ at the suggestion of its first executive mayor.

It was an unpopular name at first.

But then something odd happened: scientists working on the Mossel Bay Archaeology Project (MAP) discovered the earliest evidence for modern human behaviour just west of Eden’s only harbour town - Mossel Bay.

Geneticists have known for some time that all of us stem from a core population of about 600 people who lived on the African continent about 165,000 years ago; MAP has proved that they lived in Eden - and its scientists discovered this long after the region got its new name. (In the biblical book of Genesis, of course, ‘Eden’ is the garden in which human life - and human folly - began).

Seven years after they started their work, and, strangely enough, around about seven years after Eden adopted its new name, the leaders of the Project - Professor of Paleoanthropology Curtis Marean of the Institute of Human Origins at the Arizona State University’s School of Human Evolution and Social Change and South Africa’s Dr. Peter Nilssen, and their team of nearly fifty scientists - made their findings public.

And now we know that Eden really IS Eden…

This is where man first made complex tools (or, as the scientists like to say, ‘here is the earliest evidence for the use of bladelet technology’), where man first used ochres as paints and dyes (‘in symbolling’) and where our patient ancestors began systematically harvesting the sea (which gave us the essential Omega-3 fatty acids we needed for the development of our brains).

The problem for we moderns, though, we instant gratificationists, is that you can’t, you know, see this stuff. It’s buried, and it’s hidden. And it’s difficult to interpret.

But don’t be lulled into thinking that history took a leap from 165,000 years ago to the arrival of Bartolomeu Dias and friends in 1488 (Dias, the earliest of South Africa’s European tourist, first hit our famous beaches in - you got it - Mossel Bay). Because, of course, people have lived in the Eden District almost continuously - and they’ve left their marks for those who care to find them.

Perhaps the most dramatic evidence of the pre-1488 history of Eden are the ancient Khoi-san fish traps that one finds all along the coast westwards of Mossel Bay: they’re dry-packed stone walls, sinuous in shape and really hauntingly lovely, behind which the fish were trapped in shallow pans when the tide ran out. They’re evidence of an enormous elegance of thought about - and observation of - time and tides, and some of them - especially those along our more remote rocky shores - remain remarkably intact.

Even older, though, are the huge shell middens that have accumulated on the sandy shores of the area - but they’re hidden, of course, and you need a guide to show them to you, and to interpret them.

Fred Orban, an environmental activist, opens the window onto the past for hundreds of walkers every year through his luxury hiking trails - the self-catered ‘Hunter-Gatherer’ and the rather more luxurious ‘Oystercatcher’ - both of which traverse the coast that our forefathers found so hospitable. His guides have made a study of the way the old people lived, and, walking with them, beaches and rocky cliffs that might at first appear barren, forbidding and inhospitable, slowly reveal themselves as the ideal incubators for the emergence of modern behaviour. (At present, this is the only commercial outfit offering tours that touch on the Mossel Bay Archaeology project - although this is set to change).

ROCK ART
But the most famous - and most famously enigmatic - of all the evidence of our ancient ancestors’ journey through Africa are its rock art galleries, which, in the Eden District, survive mostly in the drier parts of the Garden Route and Klein Karoo.

They’re mysterious but deeply fragile and access to them is often difficult - and anyone with a passing interest in conservation will agree that this is as it should be, because they’re also open to abuse and vandalism. And, as a non-renewable resource that stretches thirty thousand and more years into our history, they need all the protection of both the law and the activists. Which is a strong argument for only visiting rock art sites in the company of qualified, competent, and knowledgeable guides.

At least three companies in Eden organise regular visits: Petro Potgieter of Red Stone Hills Holiday Farm, between Calitzdorp and Oudtshoorn, and on the slopes of the Swartberg range in the northern part of the Klein Karoo, arranges regular geology, environmental, and archaeological tours of the area lead by Dr. John Almond and his wife, the archaeologist Madelon Almond.

At San Valley / Mountain Pastures Private Game Reserve - which has more than 500 known rock art sites, Dave Hodgson offers an unusual tour by quad bike to a series of caves and overhangs between Avontuur and Uniondale in the heart of the Outeniqua Mountains.

Many people believe that there are almost no surviving rock art sites south of the Outeniquas, but Nico Histerman (who regularly takes visitors on informal rambles of his Bonniedale Holiday Farm) can prove them wrong. Bonniedale lies north of Mossel Bay, in an area that has a very specific and unique vegetation - and he’s learned to identify new sites by the presence of a species of cabbage tree which, he’ll tell you, wouldn’t usually grow on the higher slopes - but were probably sown there when the artists ate their fruit at the shelters and discarded their seeds.

INSPIRATON
With all this rich, diverse, but mysterious history, it’s hardly surprising that Eden is a place of great inspiration for the artists of today.

Guy Thesen, whose family name is synonymous with the economy of Knysna during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, and whose father, Hjalmer, was a well-known writer and story teller with an all-absorbing love of the area (and, naturally, it’s rock art), will open an exhibition of sculptures and oil paintings on glass at Knysna Fine Art on the 9th8of May, entitled ‘Considering Therianthropes.’

“Therianthrope is a Greek word for an animal with a human form,” he said, “and I’ve been looking at them as they were painted by the San / Bushmen and the shamans - the healers in the community.

“They would go into massive, deep, very deep trances, and if they reached a certain level, often they would have these - sort of - brain storms, where imagery and hallucinations would occur and where, for instance, colours would have sounds, and often the imagery of the animals that they would see would fuse with the human forms.”

And this, he said, is the basis for many of the rock paintings you can see in Eden (and around Africa) today.

These are not simple snapshots of life as it was seen by some primitives living off the land - they are deeply meaningful records of their time. “Even the ochres and dyes they used were chosen for their spiritual significance,” said Mr. Thesen.

And in many ways, they’re symbolic of the Eden District as it’s been for 165,000 years (and, with the recent promulgation of the Garden Route National Park, one hopes as it will be for many generations to come): beautifully simple on the surface, but fascinatingly complex for those who care to explore.

Resources:
•    Mossel Bay Archaeology Project http://www.visitmosselbay.co.za/archaeology/
•    Hunter-Gatherer Trail http://www.oystercatchertrail.co.za/huntergatherer.htm
•    Oystercatcher Trail http://www.oystercatchertrail.co.za/
•    Red Stone Hills Holiday Farm http://www.redstone.co.za
•    San Valley / Mountain Pastures Private http://www.sanvalley.za.com/mountain_pastures.htm
•    Bonniedale Holiday Farm http://www.bonniedale.com/
•    Knysna Fine Art http://finearts.co.za/
•    Guy Thesen http://www.finearts.co.za/artists/guy-thesen.html
•    Eden District http://www.edendm.co.za/