2021年托福阅读PASSAGE 32
试题及答案
PASSAGE 32
By 1776 the fine art of painting as it had developed in western Europe up to this time had been introduced into the American colonies through books and prints, European visitors and immigrants, and traveling colonists who brought back copies (and a few original) of old master paintings and acquaintance with European art institutions.
By the outbreak of the Revolution against British rule in 1776, the status of the artists had already undergone change. In the mid-eighteenth century, painters had been willing to assume such artisan-related tasks as varnishing, gilding teaching, keeping shops, and painting wheel carriages, hous, and signs. The terminology by which artists were described at the time suggests their status: "limner" was usually applied to the anonymous portrait painter up to the 1760's; "painter" characterized anyone who could paint a flat surfa
ce. By the cond half of the century, colonial artists who were trained in England or educated in the classics rejected the status of laborer and thought of themlves as artists. Some colonial urban portraitists, such as John Singleton Copley, Benjamin West, and Charles Wilson Peale, consorted with affluent patrons.
Although subject to fluctuations in their economic status, all three enjoyed sufficient patronage to allow them to maintain an image of themlves as professional artists, an image indicated by their custom of signing their paintings. A few art collectors James Bowdoin III of Boston, William Byrd of Virginian, and the Aliens and Hamiltons of Philadelphia introduced European art traditions to tho colonists privileged to visit their galleries, especially aspiring artists, and established in their respective communities the idea of the value of art and the need for institutions devoted to its encouragement.
Although the colonists tended to favor portraits, they also accepted landscapes, historical works, and political engravings as appropriate artistic subjects. With the coming of independence from the British Crown, a sufficient number of artists and their works were
available to rve nationalistic purpos. The achievements of the colonial artists, particularly tho of Copley, West, and Peale, lent credence to the boast that the new nation was capable of encouraging genius and that political liberty was congenial to the development of taste — a necessary step before art could assume an important role in the new republic.
1. What does the passage mainly discuss?
(A) European influence on colonial American painting
(B) The importance of patronage to artist
(C) The changing status of artists in the American colonies in the eighteenth century
(D) Subjects preferred by artists in the American colonies in the eighteenth century.
2. The word "outbreak" in line 5 is clost in meaning to
(A) cau
(B) beginning
(C) position
(D) explanation
3. The word "undergone" in line 6 is clost in meaning to
(A) led to
(B) transformed
(C) preferred
(D) experienced
4. According to the passage , before the American Revolution the main task of limners was to
(A) paint wheel carriages
(B) paint portraits
(C) varnish furniture
(D) paint flat surfaces
5. It can be inferred from the passage that artists who were trained in England
(A) considered artists to be superior to painters
