Abri Castanet has been characterized as a "public" cave site. Some cave art is found deep within the bowels of the earth, originally accessible only in remote chambers or carved into niches raised many meters above any human's head. These are clearly not intended to be seen by other people: archaeologist Paul Bahn has argued that these kinds of art displays were intended for gods, ancestors, spirits, or forces of nature. Chauvet cave, Fronsac, Pergouset, La Pasiega, Bernifal, Le Combel: all of these paintings and carvings would have been very difficult to look at, for someone other than the original artist. some drawings in Pergouset was drawn so that even the painter could not see his/her work: s/he had to extend the brush into a narrow tube.
But Abri Castanet, like some other UP cave sites, was apparently intended for easy viewing by people. The ceiling where the images were drawn was only two meters (~6 feet) above the floor, and the rockshelter itself is comparatively shallow and open. And, in a location which would have been immediately below the paintings were found hearths where the rockshelter's occupants cooked reindeer for dinner.
Bahn PG. 2011. Religion and ritual in the Upper Paleolithic. In: Insoll T, editor. The Oxford Handbook of the Archaeology of Ritual and Religion. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press. p 344-357.
White R, Mensan R, Bourrillon R, Cretin C, Higham TFG, Clark AE, Sisk ML, Tartar E, Gardère P, Goldberg P et al. 2012. Contexts and dating of Aurignacian vulvar representations from Abri Castanet, France. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Early edition.
