Art aficionado or artful dodger? How’d you do on our Bay Area art quiz?

How’d you do on the Bay Area art scene quiz? Here are the answers:

1. Why was a 26th mural inside Coit Tower removed before the tower opened to the public?

• C: While many of the works depicted socialist themes, one was suspected of overtly pushing Communism. With nerves on edge over a recent waterfront strike, officials thought a line needed to be drawn — and out came the chisels.

2. How did the foo dogs at Chinatown’s Dragon Gate get there?

• A: The two foo dogs were placed there as protection against harmful spirits about 20 years before the dragon arch was built. Look for them next to San Francisco’s Dragon Gate at Bush Street and Grant Avenue.

3. Who did Frank Lloyd Wright design his only San Francisco building for?

• B: The V. C. Morris Gift Shop occupied Wright’s 140 Maiden Lane building for decades. Since then, the property has housed the Xanadu Gallery, Gwyneth Paltrow’s Goop MRKT pop-up and, since 2017, the Italian men’s fashion store, ISAIA Napoli. At times, the store has more Wright fans visiting than shoppers, but store employees embrace the legacy.

4. Who painted the mural at UC Berkeley’s Stern Hall?

• D: Rosalie Stern’s friend Diego Rivera painted it, and the children are Stern’s grandchildren, Rhoda, Peter and Walter Haas. Rivera and his wife, Frida Kahlo, stayed with Stern while Rivera was working on “Allegory of California” at the Pacific Stock Exchange Building in San Francisco.

5. Why were the infamous Spirit Poles removed?

• C: Although widespread derision and plop artists’ impromptu installations were certainly factors, it was safety concerns over the cracked, weakened poles on Concord Avenue that put the last nail in the coffin.

6. What’s the meaning of the shape shifting images atop Adobe’s San Jose headquarters at 151 S. Almaden Blvd.?

• A: They’re semaphores spelling out a secret message. The first decoded message, which took three months to transmit, was the entire text of Thomas Pynchon’s “The Crying of Lot 49.” Learn more at www.sanjosesemaphore.org.

7. Why do we never see the faces of the weeping female figures that adorn the Palace of Fine Arts colonnade?

• A: Designer Bernard Maybeck and sculptor Ulric Ellerhusen wanted the figures to add mystery and evoke a sense of mourning. The Palace of Fine Arts was built for the 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exposition and celebrated, in part, San Francisco’s rise from the ashes of 1906. The figures’ faces have been seen just twice: during installation in 1915 and during a more recent, massive repair project.

8. What does sculptor Steve Penetti’s Harry Potter-inspired door depict?

• A: Penetti used pipes to create seven silver serpents and replicate the entrance to the Chamber of Secrets. The door doesn’t actually open — although you might try speaking Parseltongue to it. You’ll find the door and other examples of Penetti’s work at 2645 Leavenworth St. in San Francisco.

9. What was inside Emma LeDoux’s steamer trunk, now enshrined in Stockton’s Haggin Museum at 1201 N. Pershing Ave.?

• D: The body of LeDoux’s third husband. She poisoned him before marrying hubby No. 4 and intended to ship the trunk to San Francisco. Instead, it ended up abandoned on a Stockton train platform. When officials opened it, they made the grim discovery. LeDoux, whose second husband also died under mysterious circumstances, was tried for murder and sentenced to death. On appeal, her sentence was commuted to  life in prison.

10. Who built the ancient rock walls found from San Jose to Berkeley?

• E: No one has yet figured that out. Farmers and ranchers seem the most likely to have constructed them, but you never want to count the Lemurians out.