The sacred art of graffiti

For many years I had been obsessed by cave art. In the late summer of 2025, I traveled to Carcassonne to host a literary salon at Convenanza, the late DJ Andrew Weatherall’s annual pilgrimage for followers of what he termed “gnostic sonics” a kind of slow-moving visionary disco that would generate trance states via chugging shamanic remixes. The yearly ceremony took place at the castle of the Cathar heresy, a 12th or 13th-century Christian dualist belief that posited an evil demiurge who ruled over the physical world. In the wake of the ritual, I realized that many of the original paleolithic caves were only a short drive away. Feeling suitably magicked-up, we headed for the Niaux caves, tucked into the Pyrenees, host to some of the most astounding examples of early art forms. As we approa