Lascaux Walls Being Scraped, Watchdog Group Alleges

Black Mold Patches Above a Cow's Horns, Lascaux
Photo, French Ministry of Culture

Here I am just back from Japan, bringing you news from the south of France.

This just in from the International Committee for the Preservation of Lascaux:

The International Committee for the Preservation of Lascaux (ICPL) challenges the French National Television (TF1) announcement last Friday claiming the crisis in Lascaux is resolved.

The report asserts that the black spots, which have attacked the cave and its prehistoric paintings since 2006, are now disappearing and gave the impression that cave is cured. Nothing could be further from the truth. While the latest biocide treatments have killed the bacteria on some of the black spots, new areas have been contaminated. Melanin, a black pigment produced by the bacteria, stain the walls and remain a permanent, visual, alteration to the cave's 17,000 year old paintings and to the overall integrity of Lascaux, a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Lascaux's administrators are currently implementing an aggressive method they call "decolorization" to remove the melanin by physically scraping the affected areas. The scraping not only removes the melanin but also layers of the walls' surface, whether painted or unpainted, thus irrevocably altering one of mankind's most famous works of art.

According to the TF1 report, French officials assert the cave is close to reaching a microbiological equilibrium. This claim is strongly disputed by scientists within the state's own scientific committee who say just the opposite is happening. While the biocide spray used to treat the black spots kills some of the bacteria, it also contains nutrients which further disrupt the existing microbial ecology within the treated cave. In addition, the scientists explain, after any type of biocide treatment in the cave a new microbial equilibrium will naturally form. No one can predict if this new equilibrium will be more or less favorable to the prehistoric paintings.

Along with the ICPL, a worldwide concern for the health and survival of Lascaux is growing. Hundreds of people, private citizen and professionals in the field of prehistory, have signed petitions urging UNESCO to place Lascaux on its 2008 list of World Heritage Sites in Danger at its annual meeting in July.

There is nothing about this yet on ICPL's website. The May/June issue of the magazine Archaeology includes a five-page article, "Killing Lascaux," by contributing editor Paul Bahn (abstracted, but not reproduced in full, on the magazine's website). I've previously reported and commented on condition problems in the famed prehistoric cave, whose curator I interviewed in his office in Périgueux---here in the Wall Street Journal and here in CultureGrrl. Lascaux's official website is here.