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Arts and Culture GK Quiz Questions with Answers
Baroque Art and Architecture: Fact or Fiction – Arts and Culture GK Quiz Part 1
1) The Baroque period spans the 18th century.
Answer: Fiction.
The Baroque period roughly coincides with the 17th century.
2) Baroque art was initiated in reaction to the Mannerist art of the late Renaissance.
Answer: Fact.
Baroque artists turned their backs on the courtly Mannerist art as ineffective for conveying emotion and portraying religious subjects.
3) Caravaggio is known for rejecting the Baroque style.
Answer: Fiction.
Italian painter Caravaggio is known for being one of the founders of the Baroque movement, with his penchant for highly dramatic and realistic compositions, in which he created striking contrasts between dark and light.
4) The term Baroque means bizarre or irregular.
Answer: Fact.
The term likely derives from the Italian word barocco, a term used by philosophers in the Middle Ages to describe an obstacle in schematic logic.
5) The Baroque style was immediately preceded by the Rococo style.
Answer: Fiction.
Rococo style, characterized by its elegance and lightness, followed the moodiness and highly emotional work of the Baroque.
6) The Sistine Chapel ceiling frescoes were painted during the Baroque period.
Answer: Fiction.
The frescoes were painted in the early 16th century by Renaissance artist Michelangelo.
7) Bernini was the leading Baroque sculptor and architect.
Answer: Fact.
Italian Gian Lorenzo Bernini is often recognized as the greatest sculptor of the entire 17th century.
8) The Palace of Versailles is a prime example of Baroque architecture.
Answer: Fact.
The extremely ornate palace and gardens represent the Baroque tendency for extravagant detail and rich, sensuous decorative forms.
9) Peter Paul Rubens was a Baroque artist.
Answer: Fact.
Rubens was a Flemish artist known for his dynamic and emotionally rich compositions. He had a profound influence on several succeeding generations of artists.
Who Made That – Arts and Culture GK Quiz Part 2
10) Who made the house called Fallingwater (completed 1936)?
Answer: Frank Lloyd Wright.
Frank Lloyd Wright designed this cantilevered house over a waterfall in Pennsylvania.
11) Who made the painting Garden of Earthly Delights (1504)?
Answer: Hieronymus Bosch.
Hieronymus Bosch painted this large triptych that shows the fall of man before temptation in the Garden of Eden.
12) Who made the cathedral La Sagrada Familia (1882–)?
Answer: Antonio Gaudi.
Antonio Gaudi was the architect for this famed cathedral, which he did not live to see finished. Indeed, the cathedral was never completed.
13) Who made the painting Guernica (1937)?
Answer: Pablo Picasso.
Pablo Picasso painted Guernica, which he named after the town bombed in 1937 by the Fascists.
14) Who made the painting The Birth of Venus (1482–85)?
Answer: Sandro Botticelli.
Sandro Botticelli painted this famous work, the subject of which comes from Ovid’s Metamorphoses.
15) Who made the fresco paintings on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel (1508–12)?
Answer: Michelangelo.
Michelangelo painted the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel.
16) Who made the sculpture of Abraham Lincoln in the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C. (dedicated 1922)?
Answer: Daniel Chester French.
Daniel Chester French designed the colossal Abe Lincoln. It is carved in marble.
17) Who made the sculpture called The Thinker (1880s)?
Answer: Auguste Rodin.
Auguste Rodin sculpted The Thinker originally as part of his larger Gates of Hell project in the 1880s. He presented it as a distinct sculpture in 1888.
18) Who made the painting A Sunday on La Grande Jatte (1884–86)?
Answer: Georges Seurat.
Georges Seurat painted A Sunday on La Grande Jatte using his trademark pointillist style.
19) Who made the sculpture The Little Fourteen-year-old Dancer (1879–80)?
Answer: Edgar Degas.
Edgar Degas created this sculpture, which was unusual in its time for its mixed-media presentation (a real tutu and hair ribbon).
Clowning – Educational Quiz – Arts and Culture GK Quiz Part 3
20) Who took on the charactacter of Pierrot in the early 19th century and created the famous lovesick, pathetic clown persona?
Answer: Jean-Baptiste-Gaspard Deburau.
Deburau, dressed in baggy white costume, often presented Pierrot as an optimistic but disappointed lover.
21) This American circus clown is known for his role as “Weary Willie.” Who is he?
Answer: Emmett Kelly.
Kelly was a part of the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Combined Circus for over ten years.
22) Appearing for the first time in England in 1805, this clown is often called one of the earliest of the true circus clowns. Who is he?
Answer: Joseph Grimaldi.
Grimaldi, or “Joey” as he was often affectionately called, specialized in classic physical tricks, tumbling, pratfalls, and slapstick beatings.
23) What stock character is believed to have made the whiteface makeup of the clown a tradition?
Answer: Pedrolino.
Pedrolino became tremendously popular in French pantomimes as the naive and appealing Pierrot.
24) What type of comic entertainer was allowed to mock even the most exalted of his patrons?
Answer: Fool.
A fool, or jester, should not be confused with a clown. Professional fools flourished from the days of the Egyptian pharaohs until well into the 18th century.
25) Which clown was developed in the 16th century by Italian traveling acting companies?
Answer: Harlequin.
The Harlequin began as a comic valet, but soon developed into an acrobatic trickster, wearing a black domino mask and carrying a bat or slapstick.
26) Who, as one of the first professional stage clowns, played Dogberry in the first-ever performances of Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing?
Answer: William Kempe.
Kempe was one of the most famous clowns of the Elizabethan era, gaining his reputation as a member of the Chamberlain’s Men in the 1590s.
27) When did the clown emerge as a type of professional comic actor?
Answer: Late Middle Ages.
Clowning first began as an act meant to imitate court jesters and the amateur fool societies that were known for comedic drama during festivals.
Architecture – Arts and Culture GK Quiz Part 4
28) Who designed the Hagia Sophia?
Answer: Justinian I.
The cathedral was built at Constantinople (now Istanbul, Turkey) in the 6th century CE (532–537) under the direction of the Byzantine emperor Justinian I.
29) What is the name of the tower associated with mosques?
Answer: Minaret.
The tower that is an integral part of mosque architecture is called a minaret.
30) The Seagram Building was designed by a team of architects. Who were they?
Answer: Mies van der Rohe and Philip Johnson.
The Seagram Building was designed by Mies van der Rohe and Philip Johnson.
31) What prolific female architect merged Modernism and populism in works she built largely in Brazil?
Answer: Lina Bo Bardi.
The multitalented Italian-born Lina Bo Bardi was an architect among many other things. She made Brazil her home for several years.
32) What is the old city usually built around North African citadels called?
Answer: Casbah.
The old city is called the casbah, from the Arabic qaṣba, as The Clash and Pépé le Moko knew.
33) What great Ottoman architect designed the Mosque of Süleyman I the Magnificent?
Answer: Sinan.
Inspired by the Hagia Sophia, Sinan designed the Mosque of Süleyman I the Magnificent (1550–57).
34) Which iconic building in New York City did Andy Warhol feature in a single-shot documentary with an eight-hour run time?
Answer: The Empire State Building.
Warhol’s movie is tellingly titled Empire (1964).
35) Who was an up-and-coming Mexican architect in the early 21st century?
Answer: Tatiana Bilbao.
Tatiana Bilbao, whose family has roots in Spain, is a rising architectural star in Mexico.
36) Who designed Hearst Castle?
Answer: Julia Morgan.
Julia Morgan, one of the most prolific and important woman architects ever to work in the United States, designed Hearst Castle.
37) Whose Turning Torso (1999–2005), a unique apartment tower in Malmö, Sweden, is based on a twisting spinal column?
Answer: Santiago Calatrava.
Turning Torso is the work of Santiago Calatrava, noted for his interest in the zoomorphic (animal form).
Arts GK Quiz Part 5
38) Whose book about the Joads, trekking from the Dust Bowl to California, was much abused when it first appeared in 1939?
Answer: John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath.
The novel did much to publicize the injusties of migrant labour.
39) Which saint was condemned by the Roman emperor Diocletian to be shot to death by arrows, and is frequently represented in art as a beautiful youth wounded by arrows?
Answer: Saint Sebastian.
Sebastian’s martyrdom was a favorite subject of Renaissance artists.
40) What was the name of the successful suitor of Katherina in The Taming of the Shrew?
Answer: Petruchio.
The play describes the volatile courtship between the shrewish Katharina and the canny Petruchio, who is determined to subdue Katharina’s legendary temper and win her dowry.
41) Who was known as the Swedish Nightingale?
Answer: Jenny Lind.
Lind was an operatic and oratorio soprano.
42) What does the musical term andante mean?
Answer: At moderate speed.
Andante means at a walking pace.
43) An American author, who wrote “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow,” used the pseudonym Diedrich Knickernocker during his career. What was his real name?
Answer: Washington Irving.
“The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” has been called one of the first American short stories.
44) Which famous modern American artist also became a celebrated film maker?
Answer: Andy Warhol.
Although Warhol dedicated most of his life to painting and printing, in the 1960’s he began to experiment with underground films.
45) With what metals is filigree work chiefly associated?
Answer: Gold and silver.
Filigree is a delicate, lacelike ornamental openwork composed of intertwined wire threads of gold or silver.
46) How many beats in a bar in a mazurka?
Answer: Three.
This Polish folk dance is characterized by stamping feet and clicking heels and danced to the music of bagpipes.
47) Who took the part of the boy in the early movie called The Kid?
Answer: Jackie Coogan.
He later played the role of Uncle Fester in the television series The Addams Family.
