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The prehistoric art discovered in Eurasian caves, created from 37,000 to 12,000 years ago, has fascinated and perplexed historians and scientists. These caves were uninhabited, devoted to art, the first art galleries. A psychoanalytic interpretation of these extraordinary works, this paper addresses the motives of the Paleolithic artists, the meanings of their art, and the relationship of the art and the artists to the cave. While nonanalytic formulations are considered, from a psychoanalytic perspective, the interpretation of the cave is symbolic of the womb, the birth canal, and the primal cavity of self-object relationship. Art was created in identification with pregnancy and birth; art endured as reassurance against permanent darkness and death. Entering and leaving the cave could also represent coitus but, a on a deeper level, attachment and separation. The cave had magical and developmental significance, a transitional space between internal and external, fantasy and reality, death and rebirth. The creation of art and music, and the invention of intentional, controlled fire, marked the arrival of Homo sapiens, differentiated from all preceding and parallel primates. The painted cave might also have represented a cephalic container with illuminated imagery suggestive of dreaming sleep.