Explore the Chauvet Cave 36,000 years ago, with Daisy Ridley’s voice as your guide. It’s in the Ardèche gorges, in the south of France, that our ancestors drew humanity’s first masterpieces, giving life to their beliefs. The Dawn of Art is not just a tour, but a storytelling experience, sparking emotions, and immersing you in the past, mirroring the way the First Men were immersed in their painted caves.
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It on January 13th 2018, 1.4m people across Hawai’i received an SMS from the state’s Emergency Management Agency: BALLISTIC MISSILE THREAT INBOUND TO HAWAII. SEEK IMMEDIATE SHELTER. THIS IS NOT A DRILL.
In the minutes that followed, they were forced to confront existential questions that had been unthinkable just moments before: where could they go for shelter? What would remain of their communities if they survived a nuclear blast? How could they explain to their children why we live in a world where such unimaginable destruction was possible? And how could their own Government continue to pursue nuclear policies that threaten the entire global population every day?
By the time FEMA managed to retract the incorrect warning message, it was too late to pretend that normality would resume. Their collective experience had laid bare the growing threat that nuclear weapons pose to the world. In the words of Kauai resident Cynthia Lazaroff, ‘Nothing happened, but everything changed’.
To show the Grotte Chauvet in VR, Virtual Reality: is a dream come true. This is the cradle of civilization, and, strangely, this place refers to our pop culture, to certain paintings and films, to video games, to a whole lot of mystical and philosophical literature. It makes us question who we are. It brings us to question our identity, our universality. This is what we aim to create, in «The Dawn of Art», a closeness with the people who painted these walls, who created those images of buffaloes and beasts, who left their handprints behind for us to discover. We are not telling the story of the cave itself, but the story of the artists. What was their role in this prehistoric society? No doubt they was, first and last, story-tellers. They tapped into the lore, the rituals, the common vision, to paint and to communicate something, and thus ensure the continuity of the community. On these walls, the First Men gave shape to their thoughts.
A cave is perceived as a closed space, cut from the world at large. However, it exists only in relation to the big outside. This is where we start, with a 3D model, to create The Dawn of Art VR experience.
Everything starts here: History, Art, Symbols, Writing, Visual Communication, dialogue with the Gods. Chauvet is a Time Machine. Virtual Reality allows us to dive into this far-away past.
This is not a guided tour, but a storytelling experience, sparking emotions, igniting a feeling of brotherhood with our ancestors. Being totally immersed in the past by modern technology mirrors the way the First Men were immersed in their painted cave. Very modern images echo very ancient images.
Pierre Zandrowicz is a French director and artist whose work explores the boundaries between cinema, immersive technologies, and new forms of imagination. A pioneer of virtual reality storytelling in Europe, he gained recognition with I, Philip, the first VR fiction coproduced by ARTE, followed by works presented at Venice, Tribeca, and SXSW, where he won the Jury Prize in 2022.Co-founder of Atlas V company, he develops immersive experiences that combine visual innovation with intimate storytelling, often at the crossroads of reality and dreams. His work questions our relationship to images, memory, and perception.With Paradoxes, his first series, he extends this exploration into a new narrative format, delving into a territory where the absurd, science fiction, and the intimate converge. He lives and works between Paris and New York.
JORGE TERESO is a director & digital artist from Buenos aires. His work ranges from playful and lysergic animations to realistic VR experiences and interactive installations. He’s a partner at 3dar studios, where he created its first award winning short film, Shave It (2013).
Since then he’s been creating 3dar’s original content, always in search of new ways to expand the possibilities of animation.
Directed by
Pierre Zandrowicz
Written by
Emilie Valentin
Producted by
Atlas V, Novelab
Co-produced by
Syndicat Mixte Espace de Restitution de la Grotte Chauvet, Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes Cinéma – Le Lab, Google Arts & Culture
Producer
Arnaud Colinart
Narrated by
Daisy Ridley, Cécile de France
Project Manager
Olivier Train Scientific
Scientific Advisor
David Huguet
Music composer
Valentin Hadjadj
Sound Design
Antoine Wert
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