The most striking feature of Bushman rock art is that it is often highly stylised. This is almost always the case in representations of themselves. Although they could paint perfect representations of their animal subjects, they often chose not to. The result is an easily identifiable animal, painted in a way that not only represents its shape but also it behaviour. They were equally capable of painting their subjects from any perspective. This makes their paintings come alive in a way that few other ancient cultures were able to achieve.

The San used red, yellow and the colours in between, and white and black in their paintings. Blue and green were never used. Red was derived from red ochre and yellow from yellow ochre. As for the other colours, no one is entirely certain. They would have used whatever materials they had at hand, but they clearly had a good knowledge of what would give the best effect and last the longest. White was their least effective colour and has deteriorated the fastest.

They would often use larger rock faces over many years, adding new sections, or inserting new work into spaces between the old artwork. There are many examples of where they painted over older work.

A vast amount has been written about the spiritual meaning of Bushman rock art, as some of it is clearly related to their religious beliefs. The therianthropes depicted in many of their paintings are interpreted as a shaman taking on the form of an eland, a much-revered antelope found throughout most of Southern Africa. However, as their only means of keeping a record, their paintings also reflected daily life, observations and major events.

Bearing in mind that the Bushmen were very capable hunters with excellent tracking skills, they would have been profoundly interested in and probably even baffled at their first sight of domesticated animals such as horses and cattle. This is reflected in the many paintings of these animals. Since the Zulus and their cattle arrived in KwaZulu-Natal around the same time as the first European explorers and their horses, this may provide another means of dating the artwork that contains them.

There are paintings of European horsemen wearing hats and carrying rifles. Boats, bridges and other features of European civilisation offered new subjects to paint as well. There are also many battle scenes depicting the three-cornered conflict between Bushmen, Zulus and Europeans.

Examples:

Hunting:

Gathering:

Dancing:

Humour:

Observations:

Historical events: