#8 - Must Be True

[yrivers]

Could someone explain #8 please? In particular, why choice A is wrong and why B is correct. I now see (reading back) that B encompasses the entire passage. I chose A b/c it describes how the Native Soil movement came after Scar Art in similar forms (rural life) except the Native Soil embraced the traditional peasant life. Also the word "against" in option A was appealing b/c the two forms of art had a clear contrast. Thank you!

[Robert Carroll]

Yaesul,

The answer to this question need not encompass the entire passage. It merely asks for something that must be true about realism in Chinese art based on (any) information in the passage. Thus, answer choice (B) is correct because only it, among all the answer choices, says something that can be inferred from the passage - Revolutionary Realism and Scar Art were at least two conceptions of realism, they conflicted in some aspects, and the political and artistic purposes from which they were derived differed.

Answer choice (A) does not just say that the Native Soil movement came after the Scar Art movement - it says the Native Soil leaders "practiced a modified form of realism" and that this form was "in reaction against the styles and techniques of Scar Art." Neither is established by the passage. From lines 55 to 60, you can see that the Native Soil movement engaged in "idealizing traditional peasant life" and that it had a "tendency to romanticize certain qualities of rural Chinese society" - neither of these aspects is realistic. Further, the Native Soil movement is claimed to have reacted against the Cultural Revolution, just as the Scar Art movement did - Native Soil didn't react against Scar Art (at least, not based on the information in the passage). Thus, answer choice (A) is out of scope.

Robert Carroll

[martinbeslu]

I don't understand why answer choice D is wrong. The passage stated in lines 22-28 that the painters were exiled to rural areas and for the first time confronted with the harsh realities of rural poverty and misery. This seems to match perfectly with answer choice D. The answer choice even includes the phrase "types of art that prevailed among Chinese realist painters" to make it clear that they are Not trying to say there was no interest in rural life by any painters at all prior to that. Clearly from the passage, it wasn't until the Scar Art Movement that realist painters moved to rural areas and this type of art prevailed among Chinese realist painters.

Answer choice B seems incorrect because it states that there were conflicting political and artistic purposes but we have no idea why the Scar Art movement painters "developed a radically new approach to realism." Maybe they did it because they thought they would make more money selling that kind of art. Maybe they were depicting the country negatively to help overthrow their government. Maybe they just hated authority and wanted to rebel. Or maybe they did do it for artistic purposes but the passage doesn't tell us or even imply anything about the reason they decided to depict a scared reality.

[Adam Tyson]

It looks like you are assuming too much about art prior to, and even during, the cultural revolution, martinbeslu. Just because some artists were trained in Maoist art schools and then exiled to rural areas doesn't mean that no artists previously existed in those rural areas, nor does it mean there was never any prior interest in rural life. Artists in the cities might have been very interested in that rural life, and depicted it in their art prior to the revolution, whether they had spent time in rural areas or not. Some of those artists, whether from the cities or from rural areas, might have painted in some form of realist style. Basically, there is no evidence that Scar Art represented the first time any Chinese artists had shown any interest in rural life.

You're right that the passage does not come right out and say explicitly that the Scar Artists were doing what they did for political reasons, but there is plenty of reason to believe that they did based on what we learned in the passage. For example, when their approach to realism was eventually co-opted for political purposes, they abandoned it, so politics clearly had some influence on their decisions about what, and how, to paint. We also know that Scar Art developed as a direct result of their new experiences with the harshness of rural life, and that they painted things that their political leaders did not want them to paint, and that too suggests that politics played a part in shaping their choices. Even the irony mentioned beginning around line 15 indicates that Scar Art was influenced by the political forces of the time. There is much in the passage to suggest that these artists had contrasting political and artistic purposes as compared to the artists painting in the manner approved by the revolutionary forces.

Answer D is too far-reaching beyond the scope of the passage. We have no way of knowing what artists in China were doing or what they were interested in back in, say, 1925. That's enough to kill it.

I hope that helps!

[CPA2lawschool]

Hi team -

Long time listener, first time caller here.

I am still having an issue with understanding how "modified realism" is NOT supported by the passage.

The passage provides that (lines 53-56) the Native Soil painters reacted against the Scar painters and that the Scar painters reacted against the Cultural Revolution.

The Cultural Revolution is discussed as an "(intensification) of the absolutist mind-set of Maoist Revolutionary Realism 'truthfulness'" (lines 5-9).

The Scar movement is described as "developing a radically new approach to realism" (line 30).

If the Native Soil painters are reacting against the Scar painters yet embodying some of the same characteristics of each of its two "realism" predecessors, (idealizing - MRR; rural aspects - SM) how is this movement NOT also a modified form of realism?

While I see how B could be reasonably inferred, is answer choice A actually incorrect because "leaders of the NS movement" is unsupported?

I'll hang up and listen.

[Jay Donnell]

Hi there CPA2LawSchool!

I'm glad you decided to hop off the sidelines and into the game, and I'm hoping I can help with this question and encourage you to come on back for more help in the future!

Your core issue behind this number 8 is an extremely common misconception about the causal pattern among the three discussed styles of realism in the passage. The overbearing and controlled form of "realism" put forth by Maoist Revolutionary Realism was the impetus for the development of two subsequent movements who each originated in reaction to such a strict style. Scar Art reacted against MRR by emphasizing how drab and awful things were outside of the metropolitan areas, and Native Soil reacted (against MRR as well) by emphasizing a nostalgia for the simplicity and appeal of rural life before Mao took over.

It's easy to misconstrue the causal development to think that the Native Soil reacted against Scar Art, but in actuality, both NS and SA are the effects stemming from MRR as the cause. That relationship is expressed, albeit a bit ambiguously, in what amounts to an extremely important sentence: "Where the Scar artists had reacted to the ideological rigidity of the Cultural Revolution by emphasizing the damage inflicted by modernization, the Native Soil painters reacted instead by idealizing traditional peasant life." Both the later movements originated as reactionary effects of the original 'cause' here of Maoist Revolutionary Realism.

This concept is also solidified in the answer to the Structure question in number 10, where the right answer describes the function of the first paragraph (which contains MRR) as being to: introduce the set of political and artistic ideas that spurred the development of two artistic movements described in the subsequent paragraphs. Even here it's hinted that both SA and NS were causal consequences of MRR, rather than being in response to one another.

So, the issue here in B for number 8 is not in fact about your quote in question of 'modified realism,' which certainly feels appropriate, but rather the "in reaction against the styles and techniques of Scar Art."

I hope that this provided some clarity here, and I look forward to being able to answer more of your questions in the future!

[CPA2lawschool]

Very helpful. Thanks, Jay!

[Anshul]

Hi there PowerScore team! Reading through this thread I am beginning to see how B was the right answer but I found myself picking E first time going through this. The first sentence of the second paragraph (starting with Ironically, the same set...) pushed me towards E. That sentence to me felt like they were drawing a contrast between the Scar Art style and that of realism art during the Cultural Revolution. Thank you for any help!

[Rachael Wilkenfeld]

Hi Anshul,

The ironically in that part of the passage refers to the idea that the restrictions of Cultural Revolution was meant to constrain artistic expression but the restrictions actually lead to the development of new artistic styles. It wasn't saying that every element of Scar Art was different than Maoist Revolutionary Realism, but that the art that developed was unlikely based on the restrictions. From line 30, in the same paragraph it specifically describes Scar art as a "radically new approach to realism." We can't pick answer choice (E) because it says that Scar art was not a type of realism.

Hope that helps!

[annabelle.swift]

Hi! I am wondering how we know that Revolutionary Realism and Scar Art had different artistic purposes?

If I had to guess, I would say their different subjects (public, monumental, and universal vs private, mundane, and particular) could be one piece of evidence that supports that claim.

Would that be correct? Thanks!