A movie about cave paintings?

Sure, it doesn’t sound like a thrilling must-see. But Werner Herzog’s new documentary, Cave of Forgotten Dreams, is one of the most powerful films about art I’ve seen in a long time.

Herzog asks us to stop and consider the origins of humanity and human history. Where does our collective human narrative begin? These cave paintings, 30,000 years old, are among the earliest known records of human culture ever discovered. As an artist, it’s both humbling and empowering to see art and the creation of art, as the very essence of what defines humanity and signals a quantum leap in our evolutionary and cultural development.

For anyone who has struggled in a creative pursuit — artist, writer, musician — against the hurdles contemporary society presents them, it’s incredibly moving and powerful to see history reveal that creativity is at the core of what truly defines humanity and that our need for creative expression was shared by our earliest, cave-dwelling ancestors.