2012-02-07
Explanation
This comic humorously reimagines the origin of prehistoric cave paintings. Instead of being the product of a deep spiritual connection to nature or sophisticated artistic impulse, the cave paintings were created by exasperated parents trying to get a crying baby (named "little Gorky") to shut up. One parent tells the other to "draw him some animals," and the father angrily scrawls an ox on the cave wall, shouting "Here's a stupid ox, you little shit! Are you happy yet?!"
The joke is completed with a time jump of 35,000 years, where a modern academic or museum curator solemnly interprets the cave painting, declaring "Clearly, they were a people profoundly in tune with nature." The comic pokes fun at how archaeologists and historians sometimes project grand meaning onto ancient artifacts, when the actual motivations behind them could have been entirely mundane and relatable -- in this case, the timeless struggle of dealing with a fussy baby.