Meet the ancestors: Exhibition at Bordeaux reveals faces of prehistoric humans

A reconstruction in silicone of "The woman of the Pataud Shelter" by visual artist Elisabeth Daynes. AFP PHOTO / MEHDI FEDOUACH.

BORDEAUX (AFP).- Her clothes are made from fur, hemp and nettle and for decoration she sports ivory and bone beads. She has dark hair worn in dreadlocks, tattoos and a penetrating stare.

Dubbed "the woman from the Pataud shelter", little is known about this figure from prehistory—except how she might have looked.

Although the dreadlocks and tattoos are pure conjecture, modern scientific techniques mean the facial features of a long-dead person can now be accurately reconstructed.

Former French make-up artist turned palaeontology expert and sculptor Elisabeth Daynes, has painstakingly created a model of Pataud woman.

Believed to have lived around 17,000 years ago in France's southwestern Dordogne region, her skeleton was found there in a rock shelter.

The life-size model is one of two star attractions at an exhibition being held at a Bordeaux gallery entitled "The Origins of Flesh—our ancestors as you've never seen them before".

The other model has been named "Chancelade Man" and is also based on remains found in the region in 1888.

His reconstructed face appears pensive. He has blue eyes, deeply lined skin and long, thinning grey hair. The skeleton was found beneath the floor of the same Dordogne rock shelter. [...] artdaily.com/


Link 2: Photo gallery (10)

5/10.

Related video: Exhibition - Elisabeth Daynes - Original Flesh - Chairs des Origines



Vídeo YouTube por Atelier Daynes el 25/7/2014 añadido a Paleo Vídeos > Prehistoria Universal > L.R.2.7 nº 36.