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Quiz: The Interesting, the Unusual, and the Absurd at SFMOMA

How well do you know SFMOMA? Well, this quiz probably won’t answer that question. It will, however, highlight the interesting and unusual things that occur at a modern art museum. Test your skills below — and don’t worry; if you get stumped, you can always hit “submit” to reveal the answers and learn the backstory behind each question.

 

SFMOMA’s archives hold thousands of curios and memoranda, including at least one record of a parking ticket from 1973. Which artist received that ticket?

Only one of the following incidents is totally fabricated. Can you guess which one?

Which curatorial department has the most objects in its collection?

True or False: Grace McCann Morley, SFMOMA’s founding director, negotiated the purchase price of Jackson Pollock’s painting Guardians of the Secret down from Peggy Guggenheim’s asking price of $750 to $500.

In SFMOMA’s early days, people would write letters to the museum hoping to find a buyer for their valuables. In 1944, records show someone offered us:

True or False: Under the surface of Picasso’s painting Scène de Rue is a completely different picture of a dinner party.

Frida Kahlo originally painted herself wearing pink and blue instead of red and green in her self-portrait, Frieda and Diego Rivera.

Which of the following facts are true?

Which of these artists had their first solo museum exhibition at SFMOMA?

What was the name of the museum when it first opened to the public in 1935?

True or false: SFMOMA accidentally left two collection artworks inside the museum when it was closed for the expansion’s construction.

In the early aughts, a local performance artist protested SFMOMA’s policy against which of the following: