Painted Fruit Online Quiz | Art

Quiz Answer Key and Fun Facts

1. In this painting the infant Christ holds a pomegranate, symbol of rebirth, fertility and abundance. It can also be read as the symbol of the future Passion of the Christ. The Child's and the Virgin's left hands unite upon the pomegranate. Both the Virgin and the Child have a melancholic complexion and the couple is surrounded by angels. The painter is largely indifferent to perspective, anatomical perfection or conventional mythological roles. He is renowned for his allegorical use of ancient mythology facts, combined with philosophical and literary meanings. His depictions of Venus, for example, are partly symbolic, with an infusion of idyllic and pastoral emotions. Who painted "Madonna of the Pomegranate", c. 1487?

Answer: Sandro Botticelli

Sandro Botticelli (c.1446-1510) was a Florentine painter. His works include a series of Adoration of the Magi, a gallery of Medici portraits, a few frescoes in the Sistine Chapel, a series of allegoric paintings and many Madonnas of the gentle and devout kind.

He also created illustrations for Dante's Divine Comedy and different drawings. Botticelli was a keen follower of Savonarola. "Madonna of the Pomegranate" can be found in Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence.

2. This painting is another portrait of the Virgin and Child with a pomegranate. Besides the symbolism of the fruit, the artist introduces scenes from St. Anne's life in the surroundings, as if the melancholic Virgin is protected and brought to her destined life by her past. This painter's works are characterized by lyrical delicacy and exquisite pale lighting, a fact obvious in this painting too, where we can see the purification of the human figure and light color tones with subtle gradations: pinks, ivory whites and transparent greens. The artist painted another well-known Madonna: "Madonna with Child and two Angels", c. 1465. Who painted "Madonna with the Child and Scenes from the Life of St. Anne", c. 1452?

Answer: Fra Filippo Lippi

Fra Filippo Lippi (Filippo di Tomaso Lippi, c. 1406-1469) was a Florentine painter. He was an orphan placed in the convent of Carmelite monks Santa Maria del Carmine. His biography is one of the most colorful and romantically adorned stories in Vasari's "Lives", because, unlike the Dominican Fra Angelico, he had a rebellious life and a scandalous love affair with a nun. Four centuries later his work was one of the major sources of inspiration for the second wave of Pre-Raphaelitism. "Madonna with the Child and Scenes from the Life of St. Anne" can be found in Galleria Palatina (Palazzo Pitti), Florence.

3. In this painting a delicate Virgin dressed in rich blue cloth holds a robust child who keeps in his hand the top part of a sliced pear. The symbol of the pear is in opposition with the "apple of discord", its sweet taste expresses the sweetness of mouth and heart, which are the gifts of the wise. Known for his paintings, woodcuts and engravings, the artist who painted this Madonna also completed throughout his life a few etchings in iron, bold landscape watercolors, scientific writings and illustrations. Who painted "Madonna of the Pear" in 1512?

Answer: Albrecht D�rer

Albrecht D�rer (1471-1528) is generally regarded as the greatest German Renaissance artist. His "Madonna of the Pear" was painted in D�rer's workshop in N�rnberg and can be found in Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna. There is another "Madonna and Child with a Pear" signed D�rer and painted in 1526 which can be found in Galeria degli Uffizi, Florence.

The pear appears in five of the artist's works, among them a beautiful engraving "Madonna with the Pear", preserved in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.

The symbol of the pear was used earlier in another "Madonna of the Pear", painted by Giovanni Bellini, c.1485.

4. This painting is among the first depictions in Western art history of Bacchus in the company of a still-life composed of fruit and a glass of wine, with vine leaves in his hair. A young Bacchus is holding the glass with red wine in his left hand as if he were an image in a mirror. He looks like a human figure, like the models the painter took for his paintings from the real life on the streets. The artist paints the fruit basket and the glass with outstanding realism, paying attention to every detail. He is renowned for the use of selective and dramatic lighting and his paintings are considered to be revolutionary realistic. Who painted "Bacchus" in the years 1596-1597?

Answer: Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio

Caravaggio (1571-1610) was an Italian baroque painter, an inspiring figure for the 17th century art world. His paintings depicting fruit, innovatory for the still-life genre, include the famous "Basket of Fruit", c.1599. His earliest known painting was "Boy Peeling Fruit", c.1593.

He is the author of another well-known fruit painting in 1593-1594: "Boy with a Basket of Fruit". Throughout his tormented existence Caravaggio accomplished memorable and controversial religious masterpieces such as "Supper at Emmaus" (where the fruit is very important in order to create a dramatic contrast with the human gestures and attitudes) or "The Death of the Virgin".

His "Bacchus" is held in Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence.

5. In this painting the infant Christ sits on his mother's lap. He takes a grape from the the bunch held by his mother in her left hand, a symbol referring both to the Eucharist and to his role as the Redeemer. Behind the figures there is a mountainous landscape with a fortress and a pine under a dark blue sky. There is a contrast between the detailed treatment of the landscape and the monumental depiction of the human figures. A friend of Martin Luther, this artist is renowned for his biblical and mythological scenes with nude figures, including many versions of "Adam and Eve" with elongated bodies, seemingly boneless, adopting theatrical postures and gestures. Who painted "Virgin and Child with a Bunch of Grapes", c.1509-1510 ?

Answer: Lucas Cranach, the Elder

"Virgin and Child with a Bunch of Grapes" can be found in Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid. Lucas Cranach the Elder (1472-1553) was a German Renaissance painter and graphic artist, whose art expresses the spirit of the German Reformation. Some of his works were created for the Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I and his electors. Cranach was a prolific artist, producing hundreds of works. One of his sons, Lucas Cranach the Younger, became famous as a painter and designer of woodcuts.

6. Around 1645 this painter began to work for the Franciscans. Then he specialized in the depiction of rascals and beggars. In one of his genre paintings we can see two children against a dark background, sitting side by side, eating fruit. Apart from the chiaroscuro technique, the artist uses detailed observation in order to create an expressive painting: we can see the dirty feet of the children, the way their torn clothes follow their movements, the leftovers of their meal scattered at their feet. The painting conveys a feeling of tender compassion and it is both naturalistic and idealistic, showing a happy and luminous side of poverty. His mature style is characterized by idealized figures with sweet expressions and delicate coloring, a style often described as "estilo vaporoso". Who painted "Boys Eating Grapes and Melons", also known as "Beggar Boys Eating Grapes and Melons" in 1645-1646?

Answer: Bartolom� Esteban Murillo

"Beggar Boys Eating Grapes and Melon" is held in Alte Pinakothek, Munich. Bartolom� Esteban Murillo (c.1617-1682) was a Spanish Baroque painter. He completed many religious paintings and the Immaculate Conception was one of his favorite themes. His fame and influence were enormous in the 18th and early 19th centuries, but then his creations were rejected by many, as being too facile and sugary.

However, his rare portraits or his famous self portrait (c.1670-1673) are much more somber or intellectual, deprived of sweet and illusory charm.

7. In this painting we can see a massive woman with brown skin and long black hair dressed in a violet dress with long sleeves. The figure fills most of the space of the canvas. She holds a mango, a symbol of fertility, in her right hand. Decoration is minimal, consisting only in the woman's dress and a few other details. The artist is renowned for his bold, experimental use of non-naturalistic color and his strong lines and simplified forms. Who painted "Woman with a Mango (Vahine No Te Vi)" in 1892?

Answer: Paul Gauguin

"Woman with a Mango" can be found in Baltimore Museum of Art, Baltimore. Eugene-Henri-Paul Gauguin (1848-1903) was a French Post-Impressionist painter, sculptor and print-maker. His paintings are marked by elements of Cloisonnism (like van Gogh) and Primitivism.

His life was a prototype of the unconventional anti-hero; he was a successful businessman and had a family but he rejected middle-class family values and spent much of his artistic life in Martinique and French Polynesia. He wrote a book titled "Noa, Noa" about his experiences in Tahiti.

8. This is a portrait of a woman who appears to be radically transformed, because the painter fragmented her into geometrical segments. Her neck appears sliced and its prismatic shapes continue towards her chest, her eyes have diamond recesses. In the background there is a table with pears painted roundish, contrasting with the human figure and the rest of the background. Much of this artist's work was created in the forms of different geometrical angular volumes or areas, as if he wanted to express more than can be seen from a single angle or perspective. Who painted "Woman with Pears" in 1909?

Answer: Pablo Picasso

"Woman with Pears" hangs in the Museum of Modern Art, New York. It is one of several portraits Picasso painted of his companion Fernande Olivier, while spending the summer of 1909 in Spain. In the same year Picasso depicted fruit in other paintings, such as "Compotier, Fruit and Glass" or his masterpiece "Bread and Fruit Dish on a Table", both of them containing pears.

The latter one is the fruit of the artist's dialogue with Georges Braque and a tribute to Cezanne, from whom he borrows different motifs. Pablo Picasso (1881-1973) was Spanish, but spent most of his active years in France.

As an artist he is remembered mostly for the introduction of cubism, alongside Georges Braque. Throughout his long existence he was a controversial public figure who followed a bohemian style of life for decades.

9. In this mythological painting the golden apple is held by a standing Mercury, while Paris sits pondering, his hand under his chin, in front of the three luminous goddesses Minerva, Venus and Juno. The two men are depicted on the left side of the painting and the goddesses on the right. The artist expresses his ideal of feminine beauty - voluptuous, graceful and fleshy - an ideal that became emblematic for his art, together with the looseness of his brushstroke and the uniform lighting that softens the contours. Who painted "The Judgement of Paris", c.1638-1639?

Answer: Peter Paul Rubens

This version of "The Judgement of Paris" can be found in Museo del Prado, Madrid. Peter Paul Rubens (1577-1640) was a great Flemish Baroque painter. He painted this subject several times. In his last version, dated c.1639 and commissioned by Philip IV of Spain's brother, the painter seemingly created the figure of Venus inspired by his young wife H�l�ne Fourment, whose traits appear in many paintings in the last decade of his life. Apart from being one of the most admired and influential painters in Western art, Rubens also had a diplomatic career, trying to negotiate peace between Spain and England in the years 1621-1630.

10. In this painting a man with a bowler hat stands in front of a wall. His figure is partly hidden by a green apple hovering in front of him. His silhouette is in the center, surrounded by a cloudy sky over a peaceful sea. His left arm is bent backwards at the elbow. The artist created many paintings like this, in which the reality is confusing and symbolic, staging a conflict between the visible that hides and the visible that is hidden. Who painted "The Son of Man" in 1964?

Answer: Ren� Magritte

Ren� Magritte (1898-1967) was a Belgian artist who adopted a surrealist style during the majority of his career. Magritte combined erotic, strange, extraordinary and ordinary facts, following the provocative surrealist tradition of representing horror scenes together with positive meanings. "The Son of Man", today privately owned, was painted as a self-portrait.

It resembles other Magritte paintings: "The Great War on Fa�ades" and "Man in the Bowler Hat". The American artist Norman Rockwell created his own playful version, "Mr. Apple", in which he replaced the green apple with a red one and the apple replaced the man's head instead of hiding it. "The Son of Man" image appears in the remake of the "Thomas Crown Affair".

Source: Author alpinesquill

This quiz was reviewed by FunTrivia editor looney_tunes before going online.
Any errors found in FunTrivia content are routinely corrected through our feedback system.

Painted Fruit Trivia Quiz

In the world of painting, fruits take many shapes and meanings. Can you figure out the names of some preeminent artists, from the early Renaissance until the 20th century, whose paintings contain some fruit?

NEXT>

NEXT>

NEXT>

NEXT>

NEXT>

NEXT>

NEXT>

NEXT>

NEXT>