Art is beautiful in all its forms, however, the works of some painters make the audience fear of the picture rather than admire it. Some paintings are connected with strange and even mystic stories which can not be logically explained. The power of art can create miracles, but there are cases when these miracles are pretty scary ones.
The picture with the worst reputation is, probably, “Crying Boy” by Giovanni Bragolin. It presents a portrait of the painter’s son whom the artist made cry by holding burning matches in front of his face. The kid was afraid of fire and cried out of fear. A few weeks after the picture was finished the boy died from pneumonia, and Bragolin burnt alive in his house during a sudden conflagration. Then a series of conflagrations was reported in the Northern England – in all cases the houses were burnt to ashes except for the reproduction of “Crying Boy”. In result, the reproductions of this picture were declared cursed and the owners were told to get rid of them. The original “Crying Boy”, however, is still not found…
Another frightening masterpiece of art was created by an American painter Bill Stoneham and is called “Hands Resist Him”. It depicts a boy with obscure features and a doll looking like a girl and a glass door behind them with children’s arms pressed to it. Everybody who purchased the picture died soon afterwards. Some owners reported that the figures on the picture moved and changed positions. Nowadays the picture is in a private collection. No matter whether you believe in its evil power or not, one thing can be said for sure – this work looks really frightening and will not allow you to sleep peacefully at nights.
Diego Velasquez with “Venus with Mirror” should be also mentioned in the list of the most scaring paintings. The owners of this picture became insolvent or were killed. “Venus with Mirror” could not find its place in any museum and changed its location often. The story of this picture ended when one of the insane visitors of exhibition rushed to the picture with knife and cut it badly. May be it was due to hard impression produced by the picture – the reflection of Venus in the mirror looks pretty dark and frightening and it seems even that it is the reflection of some other woman, who looks right at you with her piercing eyes.
The famous “Mona Lisa” by da Vinci is also surrounded with notorious fame. It is said to produce negative effect on those who look at it – some people even faint when admiring this work. The most widely known case was when a French writer Stendhal lost conscience in front of the picture. “Mona Lisa” is nearly the most mysterious masterpiece of art. The artist worked over it for about six years and redid this or that detail all the time and died, not having made his original intention complete. So, may be it is not the full power of Giaconda’s smile we can observe nowadays.
