It's Friday - the second of this month and the first 13th of the year. International day of mystical failures, during which black cats take a day off.

In Great Britain, scheduled operations aren`t put on this date, and in France they make sure that there are no 13 guests at the table. In Russia, we haven't haven't chosen a unified tactic yet: somebody hastily postpones important tasks to the next week, and somebody jokes that “Friday the 13th” sounds much better than “Monday the 16th”.

Scientists attribute the dismal reputation of the number 13 to its redundancy. If everyone knows the 12 apostles, 12 months of the year and 12 signs of the Zodiac, then the bonus 13th number seems like overkill, says Joe Nickell, a researcher for Skeptical Inquirer.

In modern culture, the mystical meaning of this date was spoken about after the release of the horror movie "Friday the 13th" in 1980. The eerie landscape from the film was borrowed by British artist Peter Doig for the painting "White Canoe". In 2007, it was sold at Sotheby's in London for $ 10 million.



The themes that affect our fears are often reflected in contemporary art. Online art gallery ArtHall has collected the most mystical works of our artists in one video. Look at how The Hidden Star by Edgar Invoker is replacing by a frightening clown portrait by Mark Tennant. What happened to the popular symbol of fun and amusement? Following The Art is Dead, seen by Maxim Bashev, as an apocalyptic fire burns out humanity in the painting "Time" by  Viktor Safonkin, unleashing a deep anxiety about the end of the world. And the song still sounds ..

And let your fears about this mystical day end with it.