Why is this painting believed to be haunted? The great British art quiz

Man Proposes, God Disposes, 1864, by Edwin Henry Landseer. Photograph: Royal Holloway, University of London

This quiz is brought to you in collaboration with Art UK, the online home of the UK’s public art collections, showing art from more than 3,000 venues, by 45,000 artists. Each day, a different collection on Art UK sets the questions.

Today, our questions come from Royal Holloway, University of London, which was formed in 1985 with the merger of Royal Holloway and Bedford colleges. At the core of the art holdings are the legacies of two Victorian collectors: the entrepreneur Thomas Holloway and the artist Christiana Herringham. These collections have been enhanced through additional gifts, acquisitions and commissions spanning from the 17th century to the present.

You can see art from Royal Holloway on Art UK here. Find out more on the Royal Holloway website here.

1. 

   This portrait by William Orpen depicts Royal Holloway principal Ellen Charlotte Higgins. What nickname was she given by her students?

   1. The Wizard

   2. The Chief

   3. Your Majesty

   4. The Heroine

2. 

   Edwin Landseer’s Man Proposes, God Disposes is infamous among Royal Holloway’s students for supposedly being haunted. Which explorer’s failed Arctic mission does it represent?

   1. William Edward Parry

   2. John Rae

   3. Robert Falcon Scott

   4. Sir John Franklin

3. 

   Which contemporary British artist painted Self-Portrait in a Yellow Waistcoat?

   1. Desmond Haughton

   2. Kimathi Donkor

   3. Hurvin Anderson

   4. Eugene Palmer

4. 

   Christiana Herringham's art collection was donated to Bedford College after her death, and now forms a major part of Royal Holloway's collections. In 1903, she donated £200 to establish what?

   1. The Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings (SPAB)

   2. The Artists’ Suffrage League

   3. Bedford College

   4. The Art Fund

5. 

   The artist Charles William Carey was appointed the first curator of Royal Holloway’s art collection in 1887. How many years did he stay in the post?

   1. 56

   2. 37

   3. 25

   4. 48

6. 

   In Henry Stormonth Leifchild’s sculpture of the ancient Greek poet Erinna, what can be seen falling from her left hand?

   1. A quill

   2. A paintbrush

   3. A distaff

   4. A broom

7. 

   Sir Luke Fildes’ painting Applicants for Admission to a Casual Ward was based on the illustration he made of the same subject for the Graphic newspaper. The illustration led Charles Dickens to hire Fildes to illustrate which of his novels?

   1. Our Mutual Friend

   2. The Mystery of Edwin Drood

   3. Great Expectations

   4. Bleak House

8. 

   Margaret Gere’s The Garden of the Slothful was made in which medium?

   1. Egg tempera

   2. Watercolour

   3. Ink

   4. Oil paint

Solutions

1:B - After attending Royal Holloway College as a student, Higgins taught at Cheltenham Ladies’ College. She returned to Royal Holloway in 1907 to take up the post of principal – a position she held until 1935. During her tenure, she often got involved with student life: a photograph in the college’s archives shows her playing the double bass while dressed as a wizard. She was known among students as The Chief. Image: Miss Ellen Charlotte Higgins, 1926, William Orpen (1878–1931). Credit: Royal Holloway, University of London , 2:D - Franklin’s mission to find the North-west Passage was lost shortly after leaving England in 1845. Despite immense efforts to discover its fate, the wrecks of his ships, HMS Erebus and HMS Terror, were only discovered in 2014 and 2016. When exams are held in the university's picture gallery, the painting is covered with a union jack, as students believe that if they sit near it they will fail. Image: Man Proposes, God Disposes, 1864, Edwin Henry Landseer (1802–1873). Credit: Royal Holloway, University of London , 3:A - Haughton was born in Hammersmith, west London, in 1968 to parents of Guyanese and Jamaican descent. His parents migrated from the Caribbean in the late 1950s. By painting works such as this self-portrait, Haughton aims to redress the imbalance in western art, which has usually depicted black people as anonymous or as stereotypes. In his own words, he gives his sitters the 'status they deserve'. Image: Self-Portrait in a Yellow Waistcoat, 1993, Desmond Haughton (b 1968) © the artist. Credit: Royal Holloway, University of London, 4:D - Herringham – along with DS MacColl and Roger Fry – was one of the founders of the Art Fund. She was also the only woman on the organisation’s committee. She resigned in 1906, increasingly frustrated at the refusal of the other committee members to appoint any other women. A passionate supporter of artistic and social causes, she was also a member of SPAB and the Artists’ Suffrage League. Image: Pink Aquilegia, Yellow Foxgloves, Cow Parsley, Christiana Jane Herringham (1852–1929). Credit: Royal Holloway, University of London, 5:A - Carey remained at Royal Holloway until his death in 1943. As with our current situation during the pandemic, he had to oversee closures to the picture gallery in which the collections were housed. This included closing for the protection of the collections in 1913 after a suffrage arson attack nearby as well as a number of suffragette attacks on art in other galleries. Image: South West Terrace Steps, Royal Holloway, 1896, Charles William Carey (1862–1943). Credit: Royal Holloway, University of London, 6:C - Erinna was a contemporary and friend of Sappho. Her parents refused to let her pursue her poetry and forced her to stay at home and undertake domestic tasks instead. The symbolism of the distaff in the sculpture is twofold. As a tool used in spinning, it alludes to her domestic drudgery, but it is also a reference to her poem The Distaff. Image: Erinna, 1860, Henry Stormonth Leifchild (1823–1884). Credit: Royal Holloway, University of London, 7:B - The Mystery of Edwin Drood was Dickens’s final novel. It remained unfinished on his death in 1870. In his work, Fildes, like Dickens, aimed to bring attention to the plight of the poor and bring about societal change. His attempts weren’t always popular, with some critics arguing that such ‘ugly’ subjects were inappropriate for fine art. Image: Applicants for Admission to a Casual Ward, 1874, Luke Fildes (1843–1927). Credit: Royal Holloway, University of London, 8:A - At the turn of the 20th century, Gere was one of a small group of artists leading a revival of the medium of egg tempera. She was a member of the Society of Painters in Tempera, which was co-founded in 1901 by Christiana Herringham and Joseph Southall. Herringham regularly supported contemporary female artists and purchased this work at the Society’s exhibition in 1905. Image: The Garden of the Slothful, c.1901, Margaret Gere (1878–1965) © the artist's estate. Credit: Royal Holloway, University of London

Scores

1. 6 and above.

   Maybe it's because you're a Londoner!

2. 0 and above.

   Try better next time!

3. 3 and above.

   Not 'arf bad