On the DNA Dance Floor, oil and mixed media on canvas, 140 x 120 cm, 2019. 

An imaginary scene over thousands of years as early modern humans and Neanderthals interact – hunting and gathering, dancing, and interbreeding.

On the DNA Dance Floor,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.

The Last Neanderthal’s Garden, oil on canvas, 140 x 160 cm, 2019

Some 30,000 years ago, early modern humans come to pay their respects to the last of the ancient Neanderthals, a solitary female lovingly tending her wild garden. She has only hours to live. But the moment has been prepared for…

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.

The Secret World of Drawing Pictures

In February 2018, I gave this Open Lecture as part of the University of Edinburgh’s Centre for Open Learning Programme.

Can the intimacy of the thumbnail sketch, raw and untethered reveal secret thoughts and hidden meaning? Artist and Lecturer Robbie Bushe deconstructs both his own and his heroes’ pictorial drawings and paintings and retraces their roots in early doodles and sketches.