The virtual Chauvet cave, a journey to the dawn of art

Audio 02:31

By: Dominique Desaunay Follow

Welcome to the Chauvet cave in Ardèche, a marvel of 36,000 year old prehistoric art. The Google Arts & Culture web platform and the Joint Syndicate of the Chauvet cave invite us in 3D to this sanctuary in complete immersion using virtual and augmented reality technologies.

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Horses, aurochs, woolly rhinoceros, mammoths ... This 36,000-year time journey, to which you are invited in 3D Google, is available both on the Web, on augmented reality helmets and in 360 ° video on smartphones . The project required the development of new digitization techniques, said Amit Sood, director of Google Arts & Culture: " The biggest difficulties were technical. On the one hand, to access the cave, then to digitize a colossal mass of data in order to facilitate the user experience on smartphone . The first problem was to capture images in high resolution, the second to compress them so that we can access them easily and quickly from a mobile. The other challenge was educational, to tell the story well so that users, for educational purposes, benefit from precise information that inspires and fascinates them. "

► Guided tour of the Chauvet cave on Google Arts & Culture , for an immersive journey within the cave in a new experience in virtual reality.

Since its discovery in 1994, the Chauvet cave has been closed to the public. His virtual reconstruction offers to visit in detail these artistic gems, classified as World Heritage by Unesco , without damaging them. It is also a way of transmitting our own cultural heritage to future generations without denying anything of our past, says Pascal Terrasse, president of the Joint Syndicate of the Chauvet cave: " These three-dimensional images are also a way of leaving a trace of ourselves, a trace of digital when today's world likes to show itself in photos. But we also notice that prehistoric men never showed up, only represented their 36,000 years, they had already invented perspective and demonstrated an intelligence and an absolutely remarkable aestheticism. "

This virtual exploration is completed with an explanatory documentary fund, also in 3D, which accompanies each of your steps in the cave, a permanent exhibition to understand the state of mind that animated our ancestors, according to David Huguet, project manager of the replica of the Chauvet Cave : " The idea of ​​the exhibitions that we call stories on Google Art & Culture, is to provide content to allow people to understand what the Chauvet Cave was 36,000 years ago . Our ancestors went to the cave to draw symbols and probably to transmit them. The animal is everywhere, the most important is the bear. If men have invested this cave, it is because the bear was already there! This is what we wanted to restore within the exhibitions presenting this geographic, climatological and cultural context. "

► On Google Arts & Culture, guided tour of history: At the heart of the sanctuary, the fresco of lions

Even with a lot of imagination, it is always impossible to guess the intentions of our ancestors the Sapiens who carried out these frescoes, only remains the emotion of this heritage and the dazzling testimony of their passage.

► Also listen: Chauvet Pont d'Arc Cave, treasure of our ancestors

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