Animals and Men: Their Relationship as Reflected in Western Art from Prehistory to the Present Day

Kenneth Clark – 1977
 

An unusual art book by the great Kenneth Clark commissioned by the World Wildlife Fund.  I imagine they expected more of a pamphlet or at least a handier pocket-sized book, but asking Clark to write about art would be like asking Gore Vidal to write a novel about U.S. history; he’s going to make it consequential or not bother at all.  His subject is the depiction of animals in art over the centuries, but rather than creating a concise and pedestrian survey, Clark evolves the book into a complex and frequently disturbing analysis of mankind’s attitudes about animals and what they say about us as a race.  Projecting powers of good and evil, traits of friendship and even personalities onto various animals is one of humanity’s most common and unifying habits.  This can result in a devotion to pets on one extreme, and blood sacrifices for religious reward on the other.  Mixed into this dynamic are the ambivalent feelings stirred by the practices of hunting for sport and farming animals for food.  Clark’s examples span from cave paintings of buffalo to Picasso’s many portrayals of bull-fights.  Moving from era to era, Clark asks difficult questions, about such things as how we as a race can imagine some animals to be sacred and symbolic and then condemn others to the cruelest tortures for our entertainment.  The book’s illustrations of countless paintings and statues become a mysterious kaleidoscope of individual artists’ feelings of fear, admiration and confusion about the animals they depict.  The effect is almost exasperating because of the absurdity of the entire phenomenon; humanity placing so much value on animals while the animals themselves are utterly indifferent except in cases when they are made to fear or tolerate us.