“The cave painters did have a wide range of colors in their palette, but the two that dominated everywhere were black obtained from manganese dioxide or occasionally charcoal, and red, obtained from iron oxide. The colored minerals were pulverized and then mixed with some fluid to make the paint. Often the fluid was water from the cave itself. It contained dissoved minerals from that particular place, which made the paint bind to the cave’s walls more easily.

The artistic techniques remained identical during the many millennia that cave painting lasted. The artists chipped tiny, pointed chisels from flints to use as engravers. They sometimes used crayons of charcoal or paintbrushes made from animal hairs. More frequently they used wads of fur or perhaps moss and pressed them on the walls. Just as frequently they blew the paint onto the wall by using a hollow reed or bone pipe or by putting the paint in their mouths and spitting it on in a series of explosive puffs made with the lips. When blowing the paint, they used either their hands or a stencil of bark or hide in order to make the shape they desired.

[The] immutable similarity in themes, colors, and techniques shows that the cave paintings were the creation of artists working in a cultural tradition that survived for more than 20,000 years.”

—Gregory Curtis, The Cave Painters: Probing the Mysteries of the World’s First Artists, 2006. Pic is of the Hall of Bulls at Lascaux.