PrepTest 144, Section 4, Question 10
Richard: Because it fails to meet the fundamental(59 more words not shown)
Richard and Jung-Su disagree over(1 more words not shown)
- Amakers of abstract(4 more words not shown)
- Bthe fundamental requirement(6 more words not shown)
- Cmusicians may reject(2 more words not shown)
- Dabstract art will(5 more words not shown)
- Eabstract art is(1 more words not shown)
Reading the argument
Does art have to represent something? Richard says yes: that's a fundamental requirement. He thinks abstract art fails that requirement and predicts that people will eventually see it as a departure from what art should be.
I could imagine someone challenging the requirement itself. Maybe art's purpose is to make us think or feel something, whether or not it represents an object. Let's see whether Jung-Su takes that approach.
She doesn't. She says abstract art does represent something.
The distinction is between representing an object literally and representing its formal features. Think about an object's shape or arrangement rather than a picture that looks like the object in everyday life. Jung-Su says abstract artists represent those features by moving away from our usual perspective. So she isn't saying, “Representation doesn't matter.” She's saying, “Abstract art does that, just in a different way.”
What we’re looking for
That gives us two closely related questions: does abstract art represent anything, and does it meet Richard's requirement for art? Richard rejects it for failing to represent; Jung-Su defends it by explaining what it represents. The disagreement question asks us to find a claim they take opposite sides on. We need to be able to point to a yes from one speaker and a no from the other, rather than guess what either person probably believes.
Working the answers
- A
Rejecting literal representation doesn't separate these speakers. Richard thinks abstract art fails to represent at all. Jung-Su allows that abstract artists reject literal representation, but she says they still represent formal features. Her defense isn't that abstract art gives us literal pictures. It's that literal pictures aren't the only way to represent something.
- B
This is the response I initially wondered whether Jung-Su would give: perhaps representation isn't required for art. But she never says that. She answers Richard by arguing that abstract art meets the requirement he thinks it fails. Challenging whether something meets a requirement isn't the same as rejecting the requirement itself. Richard supports B; we can't identify a rejection of B from Jung-Su.
- C
Richard never discusses musicians. Jung-Su brings them up as a comparison, but we don't know whether Richard accepts what she says about them. Without a position from each speaker, we don't have a disagreement.
- D
I'd guess Jung-Su hopes people won't dismiss abstract art. But what does she actually say about their future opinions? “Whatever others might come to say” leaves that question open. She insists that abstract art belongs in the mainstream regardless of how others describe it.
Those claims can come apart. People could someday dismiss abstract art, as Richard predicts, while Jung-Su would still consider it legitimate art. Her defense of abstract art doesn't establish that she rejects his prediction about what other people will think.
- ECorrect
Richard says abstract art fails to represent. Jung-Su says it represents the formal features of objects. There's our clear no and yes to the same claim. They disagree about whether abstract art is representational, even though Jung-Su accepts that its representation needn't be literal.
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