Raymond Dart
Advertures with the missing linkFebruary 4 1893 — November 22 1988 |
Artist: Marco Cianfanelli Location: Corner Yale and Enoch Sontonga Streets, Braamfontein, Johannesburg
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Marco Cianfanelli with the contoured concrete memorial he sculpted in honour of Raymond Dart, who discovered the Taung Skull, proving that Africa is the birthplace of humankind. Picture: Alex Dodd On December 23 1924, Raymond Dart discovered the Taung skull, which proved humankind began in Africa. Using one of his wife's knitting needles, he scraped through rock for 73 days to reveal the million-year-old face of an early human baby with a full set of milk teeth. Dart later wrote, "I doubt if there was any parent prouder of his offspring than I was of my Taungs [sic] baby on that Christmas of 1942." From The Archives Australopithecus Africanus: The man-ape of South AfricaPublished in Nature on February 7, 1925, this was the first proper public paper by Raymond Dart announcing his discovery, and the start of the entire Taung story. Adventures with the missing linkIn this extract from his book, 'Adventures with the Missing Link', Raymond Dart describes how experts corroborated his original opinion that Australopithecus was about one million years old. The child from TaungOnly Raymond Dart could show Africa had brought forth the first human species, writes Phillip Tobias in the fifth anniversary edition of the journal, Science. Life Stories The man behind the missing linkChris Barron tells the story of Raymond Dart’s discovery of the Taung child.
No ordinary anthropoidal brainRaymond Dart used one of his wife’s knitting needles to prove that humans originated in Africa. Making the Memorial Who is Marco Cianfanelli?Marco Cianfanelli is fascinated by the act of romanticising space.
The Light Bulb Moment: The Artist's conceptThe different layers of skull shapes in Cianfaneli's commemoration of Dart, aims to reflect that humans originated in Africa. |
