Rock Art Research

This paper describes the newly discovered rock art motifs from Gua Toh Semelah in Kinta Valley, peninsular Malaysia. Red paintings are represented by single hue handprints and anthropomorphs. In contrast, the charcoal drawings are dominated by ‘contact art’ that portrays the local Indigenous experience with the maritime activities from the early to the mid-19th century. The study suggests that the local interaction with external contact broadly influenced the Indigenous rock art across Kinta Valley, and it is the visual evidence of the Indigenous encounter in the early socioeconomic activities during the 19th century in peninsular Malaysia.