Q 01/05

In World War II, the Nazis hid Jan van Eyck's Ghent Altarpiece in which kind of underground site?

A) A salt mine

B) A railway tunnel

C) A monastery crypt

D) A wine cellar

Answer · why

A) A salt mine

A salt mine at Altaussee in Austria held the altarpiece alongside thousands of other looted works. The stay badly damaged its paint and varnish before...

Q 02/05

The woman gathering her green gown in the Arnolfini Portrait is often wrongly assumed to be what?

A) In mourning

B) Curtseying

C) Pregnant

D) Fainting

Answer · why

C) Pregnant

Pregnant is the usual guess, but art historians point to virgin saints painted in the same bunched-up dress. Yards of costly cloth were simply the fas...

Q 03/05

A 2020 restoration of the Ghent Altarpiece uncovered which animal's oddly human-looking face?

A) The dove

B) The lamb

C) The horse

D) The donkey

Answer · why

B) The lamb

The lamb turned out to have forward-facing eyes that look straight at the viewer. Later overpainting had hidden the original face, which conservators ...

Q 04/05

Which 2014 war film dramatises the Allied hunt for the Ghent Altarpiece and other looted art?

A) Suite Française

B) The Imitation Game

C) Woman in Gold

D) The Monuments Men

Answer · why

D) The Monuments Men

The Monuments Men follows art experts in uniform as they chase the stolen van Eyck across Europe. The real unit recovered it in 1945 and returned it t...

Q 05/05

The Latin line Jan van Eyck painted on the wall in the Arnolfini Portrait says he did what in 1434?

A) Made this

B) Was here

C) Wed them

D) Saw this

Answer · why

B) Was here

The line reads Jan van Eyck was here 1434, in the ornate script of legal documents. It is why some historians have read the painting as the witnessed ...