Magic Is Framed Trivia Quiz

Answer: Hieronymus Bosch

The legend of the temptation of St Anthony the Great was a popular subject for European artists in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance. According to the "Legenda Aurea" (Golden Legend, a collection of lives of saints), the saint was attacked by demons while living in the desert, and subjected to various temptations. The triptych, dating from around 1501, depicts three different moments of the episode, deploying all the grotesque imagery for which Netherlandish painter Hieronymus Bosch is renowned. This detail from the central panel (the temptation proper) shows a black Mass that is being celebrated by demons just to the left of where the saint is lying in prayer. The painting is on display at Lisbon's Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga; a number of copies also exist, one of which hangs in Madrid's Museo del Prado, together with other well-known works by Bosch.

The three incorrect choices are also major Northern European (Netherlandish) artists active between the 15th and the 16th century.

Answer: syphilis

Many of Hans Baldung Grien's works featuring witches and witchcraft are allegorical in nature, and "Two Witches" (1523) is no exception. The two young, beautiful witches are depicted on a background of ominous, sulphur-yellow storm clouds - probably representing their allegiance to the Devil. One of them turns her shapely back to the viewer in a seductive pose; the other, who is sitting down, holds a bottle containing a dragon-like creature. Though scholars are still debating the meaning of the painting's various components, the website of Frankfurt's Städel Museum, where the work is displayed, offers an intriguing interpretation. The two women represent the dangers of seduction and sexual attraction, reinforced by the chubby Cupid figure lurking behind the seated witch. Syphilis, which may have been brought to Europe from the Americas by Christopher Columbus' crew, quickly spread throughout the continent, creating a public health crisis. Before the recent discovery of antibiotics, mercury was widely used as treatment for the disease - often with devastating effects, since the element and its compounds are highly toxic.

None of the other options is a sexually transmitted disease.

Answer: Circe

Dosso Dossi hailed from the northern Italian city of Ferrara, where this painting was originally created between 1518 and 1524. The work, which can be admired in Rome's Galleria Borghese, shows a beautiful, blonde woman wearing a turban and elaborate robes, and sitting within a magic circle. In her right hand she holds a table inscribed with arcane symbols, while in her left hand she holds a torch, representing foresight; the dog sitting to her right has been interpreted as a symbol of fidelity. This and other details have led art critics to identify the woman with Melissa, a benevolent sorceress in the "Orlando Furioso", the great epic poem by Ludovico Ariosto (also from Ferrara, and a contemporary of Dossi), rather than Circe, the powerful enchantress who appears in Homer's "Odyssey". A daughter of the sun god Helios, Circe turns Ulysses' companions into pigs, and then keeps the hero at her side for one year.

Callisto was a nymph, one of Zeus' many lovers, while Cassandra was a famous Trojan prophetess, and Cassiopeia was Andromeda's mother.

Answer: Caravaggio

Many of Georges de la Tour's paintings - especially those with a religious theme - feature a distinctive use of the chiaroscuro inspired by Caravaggio's ground-breaking work. "The Fortune Teller" is one of the few exceptions, portraying four human figures dressed in bright colours, and with clearly distinguishable facial features and expressions. Probably painted in the 1630s, this work was discovered in the mid-20th century; Caravaggio's painting on the same subject dates from around 1595. "The Fortune Teller" shows a young man having his fortune told by an old woman (characterized as a gypsy by her dark complexion and colourful dress). The two other women in the painting are both stealing from him while he is focused on the fortune-telling. This form of divination (chiromancy, or palm reading), rooted in Renaissance magic and severely frowned upon by the Church, was long associated with the Romani (Gypsy) people. The painting hangs in New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art.

The three artists mentioned as incorrect choices were all active in the late Renaissance rather than the Baroque era.

Answer: Naples

An eccentric, rebellious character - personality traits that endeared him to the Romantics over a century after his death - Salvator Rosa was born near Naples in 1615, and was active in Rome and Florence as well as his hometown. While, like many of his contemporaries, he produced paintings with historical and religious themes, his fame mostly rests on his dramatic, turbulent landscape paintings, often enhanced by scenes of banditry and witchcraft. Created during the artist's Florence years (1640-46), this painting, which is part of a number of Rosa's works held by London's National Gallery, shows a nighttime scene populated with sinister figures, which include a skeletal, dinosaur-like monster, a shrouded ghost, a hanged man and a naked witch stirring a cauldron. Though actual depictions of witchcraft were rare in 17th-century art, interest in the occult was rife at that time, and Rosa's distinctive work reflects these preoccupations.

Answer: Spanish Inquisition

Painted in 1798, "El Aquelarre" is part of a group of six works painted by Goya on the subject of witchcraft that were purchased in the same year by the Duke and Duchess of Osuna. The painting shows a moonlit scene in which the Devil, in the guise of a large, horned goat crowned with a wreath of oak leaves, is surrounded by a coven of witches. One of them holds a live baby in her hands; the corpses of two other infants appear in this macabre scene.

As a finishing touch, bats can be seen flying overhead.

This painting and the others produced by Goya on the same subject were meant as a satire of obscurantism and the role of the Spaniah Inquisition in spreading superstition and fear, especially in rural areas, at a time in which traditional Catholic values were engaged in a fierce struggle with those of the Enlightenment.

Not surprisingly, in 1799 Goya was denounced to the Inquisition because of the blasphemous nature of his "Caprichos". "El Aquelarre" is on display at the Museo Lázaro Galdiano in Madrid.

Answer: Henry Fuseli

Johann Heinrich Füssli was born in Zürich in 1741, but spent much of his life in England, where he became known as Henry Fuseli (an Italianized version of his surname). Most of his paintings focus on the supernatural, as clearly exemplified by his most famous work, "The Nightmare" (1781), of which several versions exist. A sizable part of his output was also inspired by literary works - especially Shakespeare and Milton. "The Night-Hag Visiting Lapland Witches" (1796) refers to a passage in the second book of Milton's "Paradise Lost", in which Sin's hellhounds are compared to those that follow Hecate (the night-hag), the Greek goddess of witchcraft and magic. In the foreground, a mostly naked witch is about to sacrifice an infant, in a blend of horror and sexuality already used to great effect in "The Nightmare". The night-hag is the spectral, golden-hued figure that appears in the upper part of the canvas; in the background, a group of witches dance to the beat of a drum. The connection between Lapland and witchcraft stems from the fact that the region was the last part of Europe to be Christianized, and its long-standing shamanic tradition was seen as a form of satanic worship. The painting is on display at New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art.

All the artists mentioned as incorrect choices were active in the Romantic era.

Answer: Pre-Raphaelites

Evelyn de Morgan (née Pickering) was born in 1855, just a few years after the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood was founded by Dante Gabriel Rossetti, John Everett Millais and William Holman Hunt (1848). Her husband, William de Morgan, was a designer of pottery, tiles and stained glass, part of William Morris' circle. Painted in 1903, "The Love Potion" shows a red-haired woman with a commanding presence who is completely focused on mixing a potion in a chalice; a black cat, a traditional witches' familiar, is sitting at her feet in an exquisitely detailed room, furnished in the medieval style so popular with the Pre-Raphaelites and other Victorian artists. Though magic and witchcraft are not typical subjects in de Morgan's work, the painting's riveting technical quality and its feminist subtext have contributed to making it one of the artist's key works. "The Love Potion" can be viewed at the Watts Gallery in Compton, Surrey, where the collection of the De Morgan Foundation was moved in 2014.

The three incorrect choices are all important 19th-century artistic movements, though none of them developed in England.

Answer: Kalevala

The work of Akseli Gallèn-Kallela (1865-1931) was essential for the development of the Finnish national identity, which led to the country's independence from Russia in 1917. His illustrations for the "Kalevala", the Finnish national epic compiled by Elias Lönnrot from various oral sources in the first half of 19th century, are widely considered his best work. The haunting "Kullervo's Curse" (1899) is a magnificent example of the artist's style, blending Romanticism with an edgier, more aggressive mood. The tragic story of Kullervo - an orphan with latent magical powers, bent on revenge against the man who destroyed his family - inspired J.R.R. Tolkien's equally tragic character of Túrin Turambar. In this particular episode of the "Kalevala", Kullervo turns a herd of cows into wolves and bears, which maul to death his wicked mistress, who had been tormenting him. The gaunt, half-naked Kullervo is shown in the act of casting his curse, his body tense with anger and hatred. This iconic painting is displayed at Helsinki's Ateneum Museum.

The "Edda" is a collection of medieval Icelandic works in verse and prose; the "Nibelugenlied" is a 13th-century German epic based on the tale of Siegfried and the Nibelungs; the "Mabinogion" consists of a number of early prose stories in the Welsh language.

Answer: Paul Gauguin

The subject of this arrestingly beautiful work, also known as "Le Marquisien à la cape rouge" (The Marquesan Man in a Red Cape), was a man named Haapuani. He was a friend of Paul Gauguin, a dancer and magician who introduced the artist to the native Polynesian religion. His striking, androgynous figure dominates the painting, which also features two women hiding behind a tree (maybe afraid of the sorcerer), a dog, and a blue and green flightless bird, whose nature has not yet been conclusively identified. Gauguin spent the final years of his life on Hiva- Oa, the second-largest of the Marquesas Islands (part of French Polynesia), where he had moved from Tahiti in 1901. Gauguin died in 1903, and is buried there, in the same cemetery where French singer-songwriter Jacques Brel also lies. Gauguin's friendship with Vincent van Gogh ended abruptly when the Dutch artist severed his own ear after a quarrel with Gauguin. "The Sorcerer of Hiva-Oa" can be viewed at the Museum of Modern Art in Liège (Belgium).

All the painters listed as incorrect answers were active between the second half of the 19th century and the first half of the 20th century.