The Last Neanderthal’s Garden, oil on canvas, 140 x 160 cm, 2019
The Last Neanderthal’s Garden is one of four large scale paintings by Robbie Bushe for NEONEANDERTHALS which follow the journey the last of the ancient Neanderthals some 30,000 years ago. A solitary female lovingly tends her wild garden as she prepares for the end of her species while modern humans search for the secret of their de-extinction, fully realised some 30,000 years into our future.
NEONEANDERTHALS is a collaborative project between artists Robbie Bushe and Jeanne Cannizzo making imaginative use of the scientific data on the physical and cultural inheritance left to us by the Neanderthals. Their popular image since the first fossil finds in the 19th century has been of hairy, low-browed, unintelligent beings incapable of symbolic thought who, perhaps deservedly, were killed by invading humans. In 2010 that picture was overturned by DNA discoveries which revealed that Neanderthals and modern humans had at some point interbred.
NEONEANDERTHALS is showing at the Royal Scottish Academy, Edinburgh from 14 September to 20 October 2019.
Please contact the Royal Scottish Academy to enquire about this and other works in the show.
The Royal Scottish Academy of Art and Architecture
The Mound, Edinburgh, EH2 2EL
Tel: 0131 225 6671
Gallery Opening Hours
Mon to Sat 10 – 5pm, Sun 12 – 5pm
Office hours
Mon to Fri 9:30 – 5pm