James Graff “Saving Beauty “ Time May 7^th, 2006

“As many as 1,700 visitors traipsed
through Lascaux every day, but by the late 1950s, the presence of so many
carbon dioxide — exhaling, warm-blooded bodies had altered the cave's climate
to the point where calcite deposits and lichen were threatening the paintings. The threat of permanent damage had grown so
acute that André Malraux, France's first and most famous Minister of Culture,
ordered the cave closed.”