1 . Auerbach is one of Britain’s most famous painters, with works in every major national gallery. He has been a significant member of the post-war artists, including Bacon, Moore and Freud, whose creative originality made the UK a major pulse (脉搏) for art.
He has also, over the decades, invented a language of art that is recognisably his own, stretching beyond any comfort zone, shocking himself and, in turn, the viewer. A special structural formality in his portraits exists alongside free-flowing marks arising from intense observation. A must-see exhibition of nine paintings and 11 drawings, it’s small and, as it is in a commercial gallery, completely free.
Auerbach is today’s Grand Old Master of British Art, famously spending 365 days a year in the studio searching through paint for hard truths to give a picture of the human form. A personal connection exists between us as I took his photograph in his studio, marking our friendship lasting almost 40 years.
During the pandemic (流行病), for the first time in 70 years, Auerbach stopped having art models: so using himself. He stayed alone in his brown cave of a studio in Camden, North London and turned to self-portraits. Perhaps this is the ultimate portrait of the artist as an old man, as he explores his own face in a way he had previously avoided. “I didn’t find actual formal components (组成部分) of my head all that interesting when I was younger and less tired. Now that I’ve got bags under my eyes, things are sagging and so on, there’s more material to work with,” he writes.
Opposite to the belief that old age may not inspire great works, Auerbach’s late career proves otherwise. Like Titian, who influenced Rembrandt, Rubens, and Velázquez, Auerbach’s powerful expressiveness is shown in his painting. His new works give an example of the idea of late greats, proving his artistic skills even in his later years.
1. What do we know about Auerbach?| A．He made art a major in the UK. | B．He took pictures of the human form. |
| C．He created his own art language. | D．He exhibited his paintings regularly. |
| A．He stayed alone in the studio. | B．He stopped using art models. |
| C．He found his head interesting. | D．He wanted to explore his own face. |
| A．He created great works in his old age. | B．He took up painting with other artists. |
| C．He had opposite belief in great works. | D．He had a deep influence on some artists. |
| A．A literature textbook. | B．An art magazine. |
| C．A research paper. | D．A science fiction. |
2 . Gilliam was born in Tupelo, Mississippi, in 1933 as the seventh child of eight to a father who worked on the railroad and a homemaking mother. He attended the University of Louisville for both bachelor’s and master’s degrees, but in 1962 moved to Washington, D.C., where he lived and had his studio (工作室) for the rest of his life. He became one of the leading artists of the Washington Color School—a 1950s movement that attached great importance to large fields of color.
He was very interested in freeing his paintings from the limit of canvases (画布) and frames. Instead, in his Drape works of the 1960s, he took unstretched canvases and hung them from ceilings or pinned them in great waterfalls to walls. Each time his work—part painting, part sculpture-was shown in an exhibition, it hung differently, never the same way twice.
In a 2018Morning Edition profile, Gilliam explained that the intention behind his Drape work was “to develop the idea of movement into shapes”—and that he was inspired by laundry (洗衣店) hanging from a clothesline.
His work is represented in the collections of some of the world’s most celebrated museums, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Museum of Modern Art in New York; the Art Institute of Chicago; the Tate Modern in London; and the Musée d’Art Moderne in Paris. In 2015, he was awarded the U.S. State Department’s Medal of Arts Lifetime Achievement Award.
In the 2018 Morning Edition profile, the then 84-year-old Gilliam said that he felt that he was in his prime, despite health challenges. “I’ve never felt better in my life. I stopped drinking, I stopped smoking. I live for this period of being in the studio and actually working.”
1. What do we know about Gilliam?| A．He leads a 1950s movement. |
| B．He stresses the large areas of color. |
| C．He has a deep interest in the canvas. |
| D．He likes to exhibit his paintings himself. |
| A．A detail in daily life. |
| B．His strange imagination. |
| C．His attention to paintings. |
| D．An idea of movement. |
| A．He feels bad in his life. |
| B．He loves painting deeply. |
| C．He makes a living by painting. |
| D．Smoking and drinking are his favorite. |
| A．Entertainment. | B．Health. | C．History. | D．Culture. |
3 . Hedy Lamarr, a Hollywood actress, who was called “the most beautiful woman in the world,” starred in dozens of films over a career that lasted decades. But there was more to Lamarr than met the eye. An enthusiastic inventor, she worked on everything from a tablet to frequency hopping — a World War II-era secure communications technology that’s used today in wireless internet, GPS, and cellphones, which makes her regarded as the “mother of Wi-Fi.”
The Austrian-born Lamarr grew up in Vienna without a lot of education in science. Her natural curiosity drove her to explore and understand the world around her.Therefore, her father, who was also interested in science and technology, often walked with her around the city, pointing out what made things work.
Lamarr's informal scientific training continued when, as a young girl in 1933, she married a wealthy arms merchant who worked with the German and Italian military. When all of these generals and admirals were coming around, she listened, absorbed and learned.
The marriage didn’t last, and Lamarr set out to seek her acting career. When she got to Hollywood in the 1930s, she quickly became an international icon(偶像). After watching World War II break out, with growing concern, Lamarr began inventing on her own. As an Austrian, she thought she should do more to contribute to the allies’s(同盟国) war efforts.
In Hollywood, Lamarr met George Antheil, a composer who would become her cooperator on the frequency-hopping technology. Together, they invented a system that made it harder for the enemy to track or jam signals on radio-guided weapons. However, it wasn’t until 1997, three years before her death, that Lamarr received professional acknowledgment(认可) for her invention.
Lamarr played the role she expected to play in Hollywood-a beautiful object to admire on the big screen. However, She never yielded to society’s expectation to women. Her story really encouraged young people, and especially young women, to go into fields that are traditionally male-oriented, and not to judge a book by its covers.
1. What mainly made Lamarr develop her interest in science?| A．Her father. | B．Her first husband and his friends. |
| C．Her own curiosity. | D．Her teachers. |
| A．She was the most beautiful woman in the world at one time. |
| B．She was gracefully beautiful as well as scientifically intellectual. |
| C．She encouraged young women to invent. |
| D．She decided to give up her acting career after World War II broke out. |
| A．worried about | B．looked down on |
| C．disagreed with | D．gave in to |
| A．A Great Inventor. |
| B．A Famous Actress. |
| C．A Film Star With A Great Contribution. |
| D．A Wireless Communication. |
