Homo floresiensiss: Hominin #11 - 1/88 Limited Edition

Format: 2160 x 2160 px - MP4 Looping video - 150 dpi

This Hominin bust by the Smithsonian paleoartist John Gurche is built with clay over a cast or 3D print of an ancient skull, from which a silicone mold is taken and the face painted into the mold. Acrylic eyes, and bear or human hair implanted manually and individually.

Materials: clay, casting, 3D printing, silicone, acrylic, paint, bear hair, human hair.

Medium: digital photography, post-production coloring, animation.

When Homo floresiensis became extinct 50,000 years ago, that left only Neanderthals and us as the inheritors of the planet. This species is perhaps the strangest branch of the family tree. Her short legs are like A. afarensis but her shorter forearm is like Homo. Found on the Indonesian island of Flores, her discoverers believe she is a new species of hominin, probably a dwarfed descendant of H. erectus. The phenomenon of dwarfing can occur in isolated island populations, when there is limited food and not many predators. Her tiny brain size is problematic for researchers.

Fossil records confirm a steady increase in brain size in hominin lineages—could it have been advantageous to reduce brain size because of limited available calories? Experts say though its brain was small, it showed expansion in areas that involved higher cognitive processes such as planning. Perhaps that’s why this hominin, nicknamed the “Hobbit” because of its diminutive size and big feet, could make advanced tools, hunt and control fire despite its small brain.

© 2022 TID Historical NFT Research Institute. All rights reserved.