On 12 September 1940, the entrance to the Lascaux Cave was discovered on theLa Rochefoucauld-Montbel lands by 18-year-old Marcel Ravidat when his dog investigated a hole left by an uprooted tree (Ravidat would embellish the story in later retellings, saying the dog had fallen into the cave).[8][9] Ravidat returned to the scene with three friends, Jacques Marsal, Georges Agnel, and Simon Coencas. They entered the cave through a 15-metre-deep (50-foot) shaft that they believed might be a legendary secret passage to the nearby Lascaux Manor.[9][10][11] The teenagers discovered that the cave walls were covered with depictions of animals.[12][13] Galleries that suggest continuity, context or simply represent a cavern were given names. Those include theHall of the Bulls, thePassageway, theShaft, theNave, theApse, and theChamber of Felines. They returned along with theAbbé Henri Breuil on 21 September 1940; Breuil would make many sketches of the cave, some of which are used as study material today due to the extreme degradation of many of the paintings. Breuil was accompanied byDenis Peyrony [fr], curator of theNational Museum of Prehistory atLes Eyzies, Jean Bouyssonie and Dr Cheynier.
The cave complex was opened to the public on 14 July 1948, and initial archaeological investigations began a year later, focusing on the Shaft. By 1955,carbon dioxide, heat, humidity, and other contaminants produced by 1,200 visitors per day had visibly damaged the paintings. As air condition deteriorated, fungi andlichen increasingly infested the walls. Consequently, the cave was closed to the public in 1963, the paintings were restored to their original state, and a monitoring system on a daily basis was introduced.
Lascaux II, an exact copy of theGreat Hall of the Bulls and thePainted Gallery was displayed at theGrand Palais in Paris, before being displayed from 1983 in the cave's vicinity (about 200 m or 660 ft away from the original cave), a compromise and attempt to present an impression of the paintings' scale and composition for the public without harming the originals.[10][13] A full range of Lascaux's parietal art is presented a few kilometres from the site at theCentre of Prehistoric Art, Le Parc du Thot, where there are also live animals representingice-age fauna.[14]
The paintings for this site were duplicated with the same type of materials (such asiron oxide,charcoal, andochre) which were believed to be used 19,000 years ago.[9][15][16][17] Otherfacsimiles of Lascaux have also been produced over the years.
Lascaux III is a series of five exact reproductions of the cave art (the Nave and Shaft) that, since 2012, have been exhibited in various countries, allowing knowledge of Lascaux to be shared widely, far away from the original.
Lascaux IV is the latest replica, in real scale, of the integrality of the cave of Lascaux. Situated on the same hill overlookingMontignac,[18] and 400 m (440 yd) from the original site, it is part of the International Centre for Parietal Art (Centre International de l'Art Pariétal) that was inaugurated in December 2016. The museum, built bySnøhetta,[19] integrates digital technology, workshops and films into adjacent display rooms.
In its sedimentary composition, theVézère drainage basin covers one fourth of thedépartement of the Dordogne, the northernmost region of theBlack Périgord. Before joining theDordogne River near Limeuil, the Vézère flows in a south-westerly direction. At its centre point, the river's course is marked by a series of meanders flanked by high limestone cliffs that determine the landscape. Upstream from this steep-sloped relief, nearMontignac and in the vicinity of Lascaux, the contours of the land soften considerably; the valley floor widens, and the banks of the river lose their steepness.
The Lascaux valley is located some distance from the major concentrations of decorated caves and inhabited sites, most of which were discovered further downstream.[20] In the environs of the village of Eyzies-de-Tayac Sireuil, there are no fewer than 37 decorated caves and shelters, as well as an even greater number of habitation sites from the Upper Paleolithic, located in the open, beneath a sheltering overhang, or at the entrance to one of the area'skarst cavities. This is the highest concentration in Europe.
Irish elk (Megaloceros giganteus) with line of dots
The cave contains nearly 6,000 figures, which can be grouped into three main categories: animals, human figures, and abstract signs. The paintings contain no images of the surrounding landscape or the vegetation of the time.[20] Most of the major images have been painted onto the walls using red, yellow, and black colours from a complex multiplicity of mineral pigments[21]: 110 [22] including iron compounds such as iron oxide (ochre),[23]: 204 hematite, andgoethite,[22][24] as well as manganese-containing pigments.[22][23]: 208 Charcoal may also have been used[23]: 199 but seemingly to a sparing extent.[21] On some of the cave walls, the colour may have been applied as asuspension of pigment in either animal fat or calcium-rich cavegroundwater orclay, makingpaint,[21] that was swabbed or blotted on, rather than applied by brush.[24] In other areas, the colour was applied by spraying the pigments by blowing the mixture through a tube.[24] Where the rock surface is softer, some designs have been incised into the stone. Many images are too faint to discern, and others have deteriorated entirely.
Over 900 can be identified as animals, and 605 of these have been precisely identified. Out of these images, there are 364 paintings ofequines as well as 90 paintings ofstags. Also represented are cattle and bison, each representing 4 to 5% of the images. A smattering of other images includes seven felines, a bird, a bear, a rhinoceros. In the deepest reaches of the cave, at the bottom of a 9m-deep well, the only human figure of the cave was depicted, in a strikingly different style. There are no images of reindeer, even though that was the principal source of food for the artists, and no image of fish either.[25] Geometric images have also been found on the walls.
The most famous section of the cave is The Hall of the Bulls where bulls, equines,aurochs, stags, and the only bear in the cave are depicted. The four black bulls, or aurochs, are the dominant figures among the 36 animals represented here. One of the bulls is 5.2 m (17 ft) long, the largest animal discovered so far in cave art. Additionally, the bulls appear to be in motion.[25]
A painting referred to as "The Crossed Bison", found in the chamber called the Nave, demonstrates some of the earliest use of occlusion and transparency in human art.[26] Two bison are depicted tail to tail. One in the foreground and one in the background. The back legs of one bison overlaps with the other to create the illusion of depth. Their rear quarters also overlap and express some transparency due to a curve outlining the rear of the background bison. Occlusion and transparency can be found in other works in Lascaux, but also in earlier works, 30 kya, inChauvet Cave, and occlusion was fully realized by at least Egyptian era works.[26] The developing artistic skills seen in the caves, along with the use of shadow in classical art, eventually led to the development of perspective during the Renaissance.[26] In the mid-20th century,Pablo Picasso visited Lascaux Caves and famously said upon exiting that "we have learned nothing in twelve thousand years".
The Hall of the Bulls presents the most spectacular composition of Lascaux. Its calcite walls are not suitable for engraving, so it is only decorated with paintings, often of impressive dimensions: some are up to five metres (16 ft) long.
Two rows of aurochs face each other, two on one side and three on the other. The two aurochs on the north side are accompanied by about tenhorses and a large enigmatic animal, with two straight lines on its forehead that earned it the nickname "unicorn". On the south side, three large aurochs are next to three smaller ones, painted red, as well as six small deer and the only bear in the cave, superimposed on the belly of an aurochs and difficult to read.
The Axial Diverticulum is also decorated with cattle and horses accompanied by deer andibex. A drawing of a fleeing horse was brushed with manganese pencil 2.50 m (8.2 feet) above the ground. Some animals are painted on the ceiling and seem to roll from one wall to the other. These representations, which required the use of scaffolding, are intertwined with many signs (sticks, dots, and rectangular signs).
The Passage has a highly degraded decoration, notably through air circulation.
The Nave has four groups of figures: the Empreinte panel, the Black Cow panel, the Deer swimming panel, and the Crossed Buffalo panel. These works are accompanied by many enigmatic geometric signs, including coloured checkers that H. Breuil called "coats of arms".
The Feline Diverticulum owes its name to a group of felines, one of which seems to urinate to mark its territory. Very difficult to access, one can see there engravings of wild animals of a rather naive style. There are also other animals associated with signs, including a representation of a horse seen from the front, exceptional in Paleolithic art where animals are generally represented in profiles or from a "twisted perspective".
The Apse contains more than a thousand engravings, some of which are superimposed on paintings, corresponding to animals and signs. There is the only reindeer represented in Lascaux.
The Well presents the most enigmatic scene of Lascaux: anithyphallic man with a bird's head seems to lie on the ground, perhaps knocked down by a buffalo gutted by a spear; at his side is represented an elongated object surmounted by a bird, on the left a rhinoceros moves away. Various interpretations of what is represented have been offered.[27] A horse is also present on the opposite wall. Two groups of signs are to be noted in this composition:
between man and rhinos, three pairs of digitized punctuation marks found at the bottom of the Cat Diverticulum, in the most remote part of the cave;
under man and bison, a complex barbed sign that can be found almost identically on other walls of the cave, and also on paddle points and on the sandstone lamp found nearby.
The interpretation ofPalaeolithic Art is problematic, as it can be influenced by our own prejudices and beliefs. Some anthropologists and art historians theorize the paintings could be an account of past hunting success, or could represent a mystical ritual in order to improve future hunting endeavors. The latter theory is supported by the overlapping images of one group of animals in the same cave location as another group of animals, suggesting that one area of the cave was more successful for predicting a plentiful hunting excursion.[28]
Applying the iconographic method of analysis to the Lascaux paintings (studying position, direction and size of the figures; organization of the composition; painting technique; distribution of the color planes; research of the image center), Thérèse Guiot-Houdart attempted to comprehend the symbolic function of the animals, to identify the theme of each image and finally to reconstitute the canvas of the myth illustrated on the rock walls.[29][further explanation needed]
Julien d'Huy and Jean-Loïc Le Quellec showed that certain angular or barbed signs of Lascaux may be analysed as "weapon" or "wounds". These signs affect dangerous animals – big cats, aurochs, and bison – more than others and may be explained by a fear of the animation of the image.[30] Another finding supports the hypothesis of half-alive images. At Lascaux, bison, aurochs, and ibex are not represented side by side. Conversely, one can note a bison-horses-lions system and an aurochs-horses-deer-bears system, these animals being frequently associated.[31] Such a distribution may show the relationship between the species pictured and their environmental conditions. Aurochs and bison fight one against the other, and horses and deer are very social with other animals. Bison and lions live in open plains areas; aurochs, deer and bears are associated with forests and marshes; ibex habitat is rocky areas, and horses are highly adaptive for all these areas. The Lascaux paintings' disposition may be explained by a belief in the real life of the pictured species, wherein the artists tried to respect their real environmental conditions.[32]
Less known is the image area called theAbside (Apse), a roundish, semi-spherical chamber similar to anapse in a Romanesque basilica. It is approximately 4.5 m (5 yd) and covered on every wall surface (including the ceiling) with thousands of entangled, overlapping, engraved drawings.[33] The ceiling of the Apse, which ranges from 1.6 to 2.7 metres (5 to 9 ft) as measured from the original floor height, is so completely decorated with such engravings that it indicates that the prehistoric people who executed them first constructed a scaffold to do so.[20][34]
The famous shaft scene of Lascaux: a man with a bird head and a bison
According toDavid Lewis-Williams andJean Clottes who both studied presumably similar art of theSan people of Southern Africa, this type of art is spiritual in nature relating to visions experienced during ritualistictrance-dancing. These trance visions are a function of the human imagination and so are independent of geographical location.[35]Nigel Spivey, a professor of classical art and archeology at the University of Cambridge, has further postulated in his series,How Art Made the World, that dot and lattice patterns overlapping the representational images of animals are very similar to hallucinations provoked by sensory-deprivation. He further postulates that the connections between culturally important animals and these hallucinations led to the invention of image-making, or the art of drawing.[36]
André Leroi-Gourhan studied the cave from the 1960s; his observation of the associations of animals and the distribution of species within the cave led him to develop aStructuralist theory that posited the existence of a genuine organization of the graphic space in Palaeolithic sanctuaries. This model is based on a masculine/feminine duality – which can be particularly observed in the bison/horse and aurochs/horse pairs – identifiable in both the signs and the animal representations. He also defined an ongoing evolution through four consecutive styles, from the Aurignacian to the Late Magdalenian. Leroi-Gourhan did not publish a detailed analysis of the cave's figures. In his work Préhistoire de l'art occidental, published in 1965, he nonetheless put forward an analysis of certain signs and applied his explanatory model to the understanding of other decorated caves.
The opening of Lascaux Cave after World War II changed the cave environment. The exhalations of 1,200 visitors per day, presence of light, and changes in air circulation have created a number of problems. Lichens and crystals began to appear on the walls in the late 1950s, leading to closure of the caves in 1963. This led to restriction of access to the real caves to a few visitors every week, and the creation of a replica cave for visitors to Lascaux. In 2001, the authorities in charge of Lascaux changed the air conditioning system which resulted in regulation of the temperature and humidity. When the system had been established, an infestation ofFusarium solani, a whitemold, began spreading rapidly across the cave ceiling and walls.[37] The mold is considered to have been present in the cave soil and exposed by the work of tradesmen, leading to the spread of the fungus which was treated withquicklime. In 2007, a new fungus, which has created grey and black blemishes, began spreading in the real cave.
As of 2008, the cave containedblack mold. In January 2008, authorities closed the cave for three months, even to scientists and preservationists. A single individual was allowed to enter the cave for twenty minutes once a week to monitor climatic conditions. Now only a few scientific experts are allowed to work inside the cave and just for a few days a month, but the efforts to remove the mold have taken a toll, leaving dark patches and damaging the pigments on the walls.[38] In 2009 the mold problem was pronounced stable.[39] In 2011 the fungus seemed to be in retreat after the introduction of an additional, even stricter conservation program.[40] Two research programs have been instigated at the CIAP concerning how to best treat the problem, and the cave also now possesses a climatisation system designed to reduce the introduction of bacteria.
Organized through the initiative of the French Ministry of Culture, an international symposium titled "Lascaux and Preservation Issues in Subterranean Environments" was held in Paris on 26 and 27 February 2009, under the chairmanship ofJean Clottes. It brought together nearly three hundred participants from seventeen countries with the goal of confronting research and interventions conducted in Lascaux Cave since 2001 with the experiences gained in other countries in the domain of preservation in subterranean environments.[41] The proceedings of this symposium were published in 2011. Seventy-four specialists in fields as varied as biology, biochemistry, botany, hydrology, climatology, geology, fluid mechanics, archaeology, anthropology, restoration and conservation, from numerous countries (France, United States, Portugal, Spain, Japan, and others) contributed to this publication.[42]
In May 2018Ochroconis lascauxensis, a species of fungus of theAscomycota phylum, was officially described and named after the place of its first emergence and isolation, the Lascaux cave. This followed on from the discovery of another closely related speciesOchroconis anomala, first observed inside the cave in 2000. The following year black spots began to appear among the cave paintings. No official announcement on the effect or progress of attempted treatments has ever been made.[43]
The problem is ongoing, as are efforts to control the microbial and fungal growths in the cave. The fungal infection crises have led to the establishment of an International Scientific Committee for Lascaux and to rethinking how, and how much, human access should be permitted in caves containing prehistoric art.[44]
^abcBrooks, Kevin R. “Depth Perception and the History of Three-Dimensional Art: Who Produced the First Stereoscopic Images?” I-Perception (London), vol. 8, no. 1, 2017, pp. 2041669516680114–2041669516680114,https://doi.org/10.1177/2041669516680114.
^Eshleman, Clayton,Juniper Fuse: Upper Paleolithic Imagination & the Construction of the Underworld, pp. 35–36, 2003, Wesleyan University Press,ISBN0-8195-6605-5,google booksArchived 19 April 2024 at theWayback Machine
^Joëlle Dupont; Claire Jacquet; Bruno Dennetière; Sandrine Lacoste (2007). "Invasion of the French Paleolithic painted cave of Lascaux by members of the Fusarium solani species complex".Mycologia.99 (4):526–533.doi:10.3852/mycologia.99.4.526.PMID18065003.
^Martin-Sanchez, Pedro Maria; Nováková, Alena; Bastian, Fabiola; Alabouvette, Claude; Saiz-Jimenez, Cesareo (2012). "Two new species of the genusOchroconis,O. lascauxensis andO. anomala isolated from black stains in Lascaux Cave, France".Fungal Biology.116 (5).Elsevier:574–89.doi:10.1016/j.funbio.2012.02.006.PMID22559918.
— (1980)Prehistoric Painting: Lascaux or the Birth of Art. Trans. Austryn Wainhouse. Geneva: Skira [first published, 1955].
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