Lascaux IV

About this place

Lascaux IV, the International Centre for Cave Art, is a museum near the village of Montignac in the Vézère valley, in the Dordogne department of south-west France, about 19 km in a straight line north of Sarlat. The original Lascaux cave, found in 1940, holds some of the finest prehistoric paintings known: more than 600 images of horses, deer, bulls and other animals, painted around 20,000 years ago. It opened to visitors in 1948, but their breath and the changing air damaged the paintings and brought mould, and it was closed in 1963. Today only scientists may enter, and the cave is part of a UNESCO World Heritage Site listed in 1979. Lascaux IV opened in December 2016 at the foot of the hill and holds a near-complete, full-size copy of the cave, made with great precision down to the shape of the rock and the colours of the paintings. Visitors walk through it in small guided groups, in cool, dim light that echoes the real cave. The low glass-and-concrete building that cuts into the hillside was designed by the architects Snøhetta. After the copy, galleries with screens, models and workshops explain the paintings and the people who made them. Booking ahead is wise in summer.