Reading comp PrepTest 140 · Section 4 · Question 2

Passage

Questions 1-6  .       African American painter Sam Gilliam (b. 1933)  . is internationally recognized as one of the foremost  . Remaining source text redacted.
Passage walkthrough
Passage SummaryTopic: Humanities

Paragraph 1
  • Paragraph note
    • Intro of artist and background on his style
  • Views, minor Meta-Structures, and the author's attitude
    • Sam Gilliam - 50s and 60s; DC; Color Field style
    • Color Field style - grew from abstract expressionism, from minimally representative abstractions to completely nonrepresentational
Paragraph 2
  • Paragraph note
    • Gilliam's motivation and a comparison to other African American contemporaries
  • Views, minor Meta-Structures, and the author's attitude
    • Other African American artists - representational, political
    • Gilliam - Motivated as a reaction to contemporaries; their art didn't have room for subtlety or growth
    • Example of contemporary - Collage of images from magazines
    • Gilliam - Wanted something more evocative of complexity
Paragraph 3
  • Paragraph note
    • Expectations and Gilliam's development of style
  • Views, minor Meta-Structures, and the author's attitude
    • Broken expectation - African American artists will make "explicitly political art"
    • Progression - Painted and folded canvases; to loose canvas draped in room (sculptural quality) like hanging clothes
    • Thesis - Gilliam advanced view that the African American experience was best represented indirectly through mood
Main Point:
By breaking from his contemporaries and working against expectations for African American artists, Sam Gilliam's Color Field abstractions were able to better capture the nuance of the African American experience through creating a mood.

Key Lines:
Lines 12-16 - Gilliam's motivation is discussed, and his work is compared to his contemporaries
Lines 21-15 - An example of the other style
Lines 28-34 - What Gilliam wanted from his art
Lines 36-39 - Gilliam vs. expectations
Lines 53-59 - The Author's thesis on what Gilliam's work demonstrated

Meta-Structure:
Exploration of importance of an artist. This is a common topic/argument in RC.

Last Thoughts:
The passage goes into a lot of detail on several art styles—the Color Field style (Paragraph 1), the abstract expressionism it grew from, the more representative works of Gilliam's contemporaries, and the two "types" of Gilliam's work. We'll likely get questions about these, so it's important to be generally aware of the styles and also the differences. A good way to do this is to rely on examples as they're described and, for ones that don't have examples, picture something that fits the general description! Luckily, here, most have examples.

Question prompt

Which one of the Remaining source text redacted.
Why the credited answer is right

Credited answer: E

The notes below walk through why it fits the stem and how to eliminate the rest.

Question Type

Humanities

Answer choices

  1. A
    a brightly colored painting Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice A is not credited
    Incorrect. (Lines 9-10) This answer features a representational piece, with a recognizable person featured in it. Gilliam's work was fully abstract.
  2. B
    a large, wrinkled canvas Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice B is not credited
    Incorrect. (Lines 21-25) The first half of this answer is promising, but then it moves into something approaching collage, which matches an example given of a contemporary who had a much different style than Gilliam.
  3. C
    a painted abstract caricature Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice C is not credited
    Incorrect. (Lines 8-10) This answer describes something that's minimally representational, in that the painting does depict jazz musicians in an abstract manner. Gilliam's work was "totally nonrepresentational" (Lines 9-10).
  4. D
    a long unframed canvas Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice D is not credited
    Incorrect. (Lines 9-10) A very tempting answer! However, this work has images of the sea and clouds, so it's representational even if it also includes some sculptural elements meant to create a specific mood.
  5. E
    a folded and crumpled Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice E matches the stem
    Correct. Question Type:
    Parallel Reasoning

    Strategy Overview:
    Review the characteristics of Gilliam's work and other styles

    Answer Anticipation/Relevant Lines:
    First, note that we're going to do a quick refresher on all styles noted in the passage. This'll help eliminate answers that better fit those descriptions!

    Gilliam was a part of the Color Field style (Line 4), which was abstract and moved away from the representational abstraction of abstract expressionism (Lines 6-9). His work was color poured on canvas (Lines 39-41), and then huge pieces of loose canvas hung and folded on walls and ceilings.

    This stood in contrast to his contemporaries, who used "strictly representational" (Line 15), including the use of collage (Lines 21-25).

    So let's find an answer that is completely abstract and involves color on canvas while eliminating anything that is representational.

    Answer Explanation:
    (Paragraph 3) This work of art matches the description given of Gilliam's work in Paragraph 3. It's completely nonrepresentational and matches his color-on-canvas style, including the sculptural element of it being folded and crumpled.

    Key Takeaway:
    Passages that talk about genres or styles of any art form will generally have a question asking you to find a description of a piece that falls into one of them. Have the description and an example in your mind.

What this tests

Question analytics

Based on historical answer selection rates for this question.

Answer choice distribution

  1. A 2%
  2. B 3%
  3. C 1%
  4. D 16%
  5. E Credited 77%

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