What the Heck Do You Know? Visual Edition
As Susan Sontag wrote in On Underwater Photography, photographs give us a reassuring simulation of reality, but they do not, in and of themselves, accurately represent reality. Think the baby in that photo is cute? You might not if you knew where the fingers in its mouth had been. And, besides, wet cameras tend to break down more quickly.
You think you can apprehend the reality behind images? Really? You think you're smarter than Susan Sontag? Okay. Take the following image-based quiz to determine how well you understand the information conveyed in photographs.
But, whatever you do, do not send completed quizzes to us! Send them to Susan Sontag - we're sure she'll appreciate it if you prove her point.
1) What does the following picture depict?
a) the center of the universe
b) a Saudi oil sheik's wet dream
c) just another manic Monday
2) What does the following picture show?
a) an Afghani wedding
b) the home of the people who live down the street from a man incorrectly suspected of being a collaborator with Palestinian suicide bombers
c) the death of the dream palace
3) How politically incorrect is the following image?
a) on a scale of one to 10? About a gazillion
b) it's only offensive if a white person carved it
c) oh, I don't know - in the right light, he looks a little like Peter O'Toole
4) What is this dog thinking?
a) "Don't look at me like that. I'm not the one who has to rush off to a job he hates to pay a mortgage he can't afford to house the family he no longer loves."
b) "If the strings vibrate in 11 dimensions, the universe will obviously expand forever!"
c) "Mmm...flowers..."
5) What does the following picture depict?
a) Canadian cocaine
b) how you remember your childhood (once you've edited out the bit about having to shovel all that snow in the first place)
c) what Canadians in the 1950s built to protect themselves from the threat of nuclear annihilation
6) Match the view of the CN Tower with the vantage point from which you are looking at it.
i) the corner of Yonge and Spadina
ii) Lethbridge
iii) Betelgeuse
iv) the critical imaginary
v) the trying not to be so critical but not being able to help oneself imaginary
7) What is the lead duck thinking?
a) "Why do they keep following me? WHY CAN'T THEY JUST LEAVE ME ALONE!"
b) "Why do I have a key chain sticking out of my head? Am I just the plaything of some demented locksmith?"
c) "I should never have had that fourth chicken bean burrito - good thing I'm in front..."
8) What is the following picture?
a) lumpy porridge. Very lumpy porridge. That moves
b) an outtake from the psychedelic concluding sequence from 2001: A Space Odyssey
c) the best proof yet of extraterrestrial life...or, maybe, Bigfoot...would you believe the Loch Ness monster?
d) Rhode Island breaking through cloud cover
e) other
9) What's going on here?
a) the buses have formed their little cliques and are ignoring the loner in the middle, who is going to have to undergo years of therapy to become a functioning member of society
b) maybe some day they will earn their freedom, but for now let this be a lesson to all of us: this is what happens when good transportation goes bad
c) isn't it obvious? Good god, man, we've stumbled upon the mythical bus's graveyard!
10) What does the following image bring to mind?
a) Bob the Builder on acid
b) a John Maynard Keynes lecture on the efficacy of digging holes as a spur to economic growth
c) my misspent summers as a youth
11) Don't you wish they had this sort of thing when you were growing up?
a) are you mad? Wasn't I traumatized enough by war rationing and Frank Capra movies?
b) absolutely! If they had, I wouldn't have had to learn the hard way not to pick my children up by one leg when they were infants and hold them upside down until they passed out
c) I'm not sure - it depends what the other 51 cards look like
12) How does the following poignant image of the industrial heartland make you feel?
a) like laughing. Industrial heartland? Please. Industrial appendixland more like.
b) elegiac. I definitely feel elegiac. Anybody got a Tums?
c) we gave up acres of prime farm land for this?
13) What does the following picture look like to you?
a) a jewel thief who's just exploded
b) the crystal chandelier that fell on my Aunt Bertha, impacting her kidney stones in ways I dread contemplating
c) six more weeks of lying groundhogs!
14) What are these people waiting for?
a) a better way to floss
b) rush tickets for the premier of Fahrenheit 9/11 - The Musical
c) forlorn...forfeit...forever - take your pick...
15) Does the mist coming off the water eerily remind you of the liquid revenge vowed by all the goldfish you overfed until they died?
a) yes
b) no
c) I never owned any...wait, what's that sound? It's a gentle plooshing noi - NO! NOOOO! AAAAAAAAAA!
16) Remind you of anything?
a) have I filed my tax returns?
b) Andrew Wyeth...or was I thinking of Andy of Mayberry?
c) love the table, babe, but it could use some life...I'm thinking dogs...smoking big, fat, suggestive cigars...doing something unusual...maybe...maybe filing tax returns...
17) Art or vandalism?
a) art, man. I mean, they have to keep it behind a fence to make sure roaming impressionists and surrealists don't deface it in the dead of night, right?
b) vandalism: I prefer the esthetic pleasure of gazing upon the pristine ass end of industrial buildings
c) I don't know vandalism, but I know what I like...
18) What the heck is that?
a) the remains of dinosaurs, restored and placed in a realistic, 3-D diorama for the edification of future generations
b) the world's most complicated game of cat's cradle
c) a representation of the power grid...uhh, see answer (a)
19) What does the following picture depict?
a) what a picture by Vincent van Gogh of a current Toronto night scene would look like if van Gogh had survived long enough to paint one
b) the unbearable lightness of being high
c) a perfectly clear representation of a downtown Toronto street (if that's not what you see, run, don't walk, to the nearest brain surgeon, because you're obviously suffering from a burst blood vessel and you don't have much ti - what are you waiting for? Stop laughing! Go! GO NOW!)
20) What's wrong with the following picture?
a) giant mutated birds don't eat piers - the salt water gives them gas
b) the glasses are non-prescription - how can the building possibly see?
c) the downtown train isn't scheduled to crash into the water for another 20 minutes
d) other
