As the distance that separates us from the inhabitants of the Altamira caves increases, we attach greater relevance to the tools they used to engrave, paint and develop the artistic ensemble that populates its walls. This project starts from two questions: how could we reinterpret these paintings – made in the remote past by several generations of human beings – using the technologies available today? On the other hand, given the relationship between rock art and its ecosystemic context, how can we represent our own relationship with today’s ecosystems? This is a pressing question, as several of the species represented by our ancestors have become extinct.

The work Perpetual Present aims to recreate the creations of our ancestors through a process that ranges from image generation using a machine learning model trained from millions of images of the natural world, to 3D printing and robotic painting on clay. The work posits that although the Altamira paintings were created in the past, we cannot help but see them through the eyes of the moment in which we live. By superimposing our digital eye, a new plasticity emerges from the seemingly inert surface of the caves.

In this way, the evocation of the past allows us to discourse on our present and turn technology into legacy. Let’s keep in mind that the systems and hardware that create the work might not last more than a handful of years, but their physical impressions might outlive any contemporary viewer. Although we tend to link technology and the future, the tools of the present are outdated, just as those of the inhabitants of the Altamira cave were.

Perpetual Present asks how the interaction of new advances can fuel our understanding and view of the world, and how we might transmit what remains of our culture through time.