Many artists today are in what is called applied art. They usetheir ability in advertise,

Text 4

Many things make people think artists are weird and the weirdest may be this: artists’ only job is to explore emotions, and yet they choose to focus on the ones that feel bad.

This wasn’t always so. The earliest forms of art, like painting and music, are those best suited for expressing joy. But somewhere in the 19th century, more artists began seeing happiness as insipid, phony or, worst of all, boring as we went from Wordsworth’s daffodils to Baudelaire’s flowers of evil.

You could argue that art became more skeptical of happiness because modern times have seen such misery. But it’s not as if earlier times didn’t know perpetual war, disaster and the massacre of innocents. The reason, in fact, may be just the opposite: there is too much damn happiness in the world today.

After all, what is the one modern form. of expression almost completely dedicated to depicting happiness？ Advertising. The rise of anti-happy art almost exactly tracks the emergence of mass media, and with it, a commercial culture in which happiness is not just an ideal but an ideology.

People in earlier eras were surrounded by reminders of misery. They worked until exhausted, lived with few protections and died young. In the West, before mass communication and literacy, the most powerful mass medium was the church, which reminded worshippers that their souls were in peril and that they would someday be meat for worms. Given all this, they did not exactly need their art to be a bummer too.

Today the messages the average Westerner is surrounded with are not religious but commercial, and forever happy. Fast-food eaters, news anchors, text messengers, all smiling, smiling, smiling. Our magazines feature beaming celebrities and happy families in perfect homes. And since these messages have an agenda -- to lure us to open our wallets -- they make the very idea of happiness seem unreliable. “Celebrate!” commanded the ads for the arthritis drug Celebrex, before we found out it could increase the risk of heart attacks.

But what we forget -- what our economy depends on us forgetting -- is that happiness is more than pleasure without pain. The things that bring the greatest joy carry the greatest potential for loss and disappointment. Today, surrounded by promises of easy happiness, we need someone to tell us as religion once did, Memento mori: remember that you will die, that everything ends, and that happiness comes not in denying this but in living with it. It’s a message even more bitter than a clove cigarette, yet, somehow, a breath of fresh air.

36. By citing the example of poets Wordsworth and Baudelaire, the author intends to show that ________.

[A] poetry is not as expressive of joy as painting or music

[B] art grow out of both positive and negative feeling

[C] poets today are less skeptical of happiness

[D] artists have changed their focus of interest

Section A

Directions: In this section, you will hear 8 short conversations and 2 long conversations. At the end of each conversation, one or more questions will be asked about what was said. Both the conversation and the questions will be spoken only once. After each question there will be a pause. During the pause, you must read the four choices marked A, B, C and D, and decide which is the best answer.

听力原文：W: Is it possible to make a comfortable living from art today？ I mean, while you're not well-known.

M: A good many of us go in for commercial art nowadays.

Q: What can be inferred from the conversation？

(12)

A．Well-known artists are well-paid for their work.

B．Many artists start to do business nowadays.

C．The man is a well-known artist.

D．The woman is a commercial artist.

This 12 man was an Italian. He was called Leonardo Da Vinci. He was good at everything he tried. We remember him today, however, as an artist. He was one of the greatest artists the world has ever 13 . You may have heard of a picture called "Mona Lisa". He painted that. While he was in Milan, he painted a 14 picture. He drew it on the wall of a monastery(修道院) dining room. Many people say this picture is the greatest one ever painted. It's called "The Last Supper". Da Vinci worked hard painting this picture.Often he worked all day and never 15 to eat or drink. 请在___11______处填上答案。

movements in the United States.

M: Yes. I would like to say that their popularity can be affected by social conditions and historical events. As an example, let's look at what happened in the United States early in the 20th century, around the time of the great depression, the art movement known as the Regionalism had begun in the United States even before the depression occurred. But it really became popular in the 1930s, during the depression years.

W: What is the reason for this？

M: Many artists who had been living in big cities were forced by the economic crisis to leave those big cities and move back to their small towns in rural America. Some of them came to truly love the life in small towns and to leave the "sophisticated society" in cities. These artists really built the Regionalism Movement.

W: What're the features of Regional Movement？

M: It's all about everyday life in small towns or farming areas. And their style. was about glorified or romanticized country life. It showed stable, wholesome American traditions.

W: Why did this style. become popular？

M: It's partly because of the economic conditions of the time. You see, the Depression had caused many Americans to begin to doubt their society. But regionalism artists painted scenes that glorified American values, scenes that many Americans could easily identify with. So the movement helped strengthen people's faith in their country.

W: What was Regionalism like after the depression？

M: Before and after the Second World War, American culture began to take on a much more international spirit, and Regionalism, with its focus on small town life, lost its popularity, as American society changed once again.

(23)

A．How historical events affected an art movement.

B．How artists can influence economic conditions.

C．Why a certain art movement failed to become popular.

D．How valuable paintings were lost during wartime.

rks and ideas. In the catalog to their first exhibition, they actually invited adverse criticism -- only because what they feared most was indifference. At a time when Canada was coming into its own, they felt that a major factor in the development of a strong and healthy nation was a vi tall and relevant art. They hoped that their works would make a significant contribution to the evolution of a truly Canadian art tradition. Therefore, be hind the Group's desire to paint the Canadian landscape lay the genuine con eviction that it was the northern landscape that represented and expressed the country's unique character. It was this concept that was to capture the image nation of so many Canadians.

Today there is every indication that the Group attained its goals. These artists achieved widespread popular success and acclaim, and their works have been honored with exhibitions, degrees, and medals; reproduction of their works can be found on everything from posters to postage stamps.

As frequently happens with popular trends, there has been a tendency to romanticize the accomplishments of the Group, which has inevitably caused many misconceptions to develop. The most common of these is the popular belief that the Group of Seven was violently criticized in the first Group shows. However, the truth of the matter is that the reviews for these early shows were nearly all favorable.

What does the passage mainly discuss？

A．The origin of Canadian traditions,

B．The seven symbols of Canada.

C．Popular trends in Canadian art.

D．A group of seven Canadian artists.

听力原文：M: Professor, how's Chinese Americans' situation today？

F: There are fewer than half a million, only a small fraction of the U.S. population, living chiefly in California, New York, and Hawaii. But they are generally admired for their many remarkable characteristics, and are often held up as an example worth following.

M: When, then, did things begin to change？

F: It was during World War II, when China was an ally of the United States. The Exclusion laws were ended; in 1965, in a general revision of the immigration laws, many more Chinese were permitted to settle here, as discrimination against immigration was abolished.

M: But it seemed that the Chinese had lived apart in their own separate neighborhoods, which came to be known as" China- towns",

F: Right. And in each of them the residents organized an unofficial government to make rules for the community and to settle disputes. To this day, certain China-towns, especially those of Francisco and New York, are busy, thriving communities,

M: Professor, there are two facts about the Chinese Americans; one is that there is so little juvenile delinquency among them; the other is that there are so many outstanding scholars, scientists, and artists out of their uneducated laborers ancestors. How can we explain these？

F: Well, we may owe little juvenile delinquency to their retaining many aspects of ancient culture. For example, their family ties continue to be remarkably strong. Even young children cherish the old values and attitudes, including respect for their elders and a feeling of responsibility to the family. Secondly, the high regard for education which is deeply imbedded in Chinese culture, and the willingness to work very hard to gain advancement, are other noteworthy characteristics of theirs. This explains why so many descendants of laborers have succeeded in becoming doctors, lawyers, or other professionals.

How many Chinese Americans are there in the U.S. today？

A．Less than 500,000.

B．More than 500,000.

C．Less than 5,000,000.

D．More than 5,000,000.

e cigarettes. However, the weirdest may be this: artists' only jobs are to explore emotions, and yet they choose to focus on the ones that feel lousy. This wasn't always so. The earliest forms of art, like painting and music, are those best suited for expressing joy. But somewhere in the 19th(上标) century, more artists began seeing happiness as insipid, phony or, worst of all, boring. In the 20th(上标) century, classical music became more atonal, visual art more unsettling.

Sure, there have been exceptions, but it would not be a stretch to say that for the past century or so, serious art has been at war with happiness. In 1824, Beethoven completed his "Ode to Joy". In 1962, novelist Anthoy Burgess used it in A Clockwork Orange as the favorite music of his ultra-violent antihero.

You could argue that art became more skeptical of happiness because modern times have seen such misery. But the reason may actually be just the opposite: there is too much damn happiness in the world today.

In the West, before mass communication and literacy, the most powerful mass medium was the church, which reminded worshippers that their souls were in peril and that they would someday be meat for worms. Today the messages that the average Westerner is bombarded with are not religious but commercial, and relentlessly happy. Since these messages have an agenda—to pry our wallets from our pockets—they make the very idea of happiness seem bogus (假的). "Celebrate!" commanded the ads for the arthritis drug Celebrex, before we found out it could increase the risk of heart attack.

What we forget—what our economy depends on our forgetting—is that happiness is more than pleasure without pain. The things that bring the greatest joy carry the greatest potential for loss and disappointment. Today, surrounded by promises of easy happiness, we need someone to tell us that it is OK not to be happy, that sadness makes happiness deeper. As the wine-connoisseur movie Sideways tells us, it is the kiss of decay and mortality that makes grape juice into Pinot Norway need art to tell us, as religion once did, that you will die, that everything ends, and that happiness comes not in denying this but in living with it. It's a message even more bitter than a clove cigarette, yet, somehow, is a breath of fresh air.

What is most strange about artists？

A．They wear special clothes.

B．They rarely work in the daytime.

C．They mainly depict distressing things.

D．They are liable to take illegal drugs.

听力原文：M: Professor, bow's Chinese Americans' situation today？

F: There are fewer than half a million, only a small fraction of the U.S. population, living chiefly in California, New York, and Hawaii. But they are generally admired for their many remarkable characteristics, and are often held up as an example worth following.

M: When, then, did things begin to change？

F: It was during World War II, when China was an ally of the United States. The Exclusion laws were ended; in 1965, in a general revision of the immigration laws, many more Chinese were permitted to settle here, as discrimination against immigration was abolished.

M: But it seemed that the Chinese had lived apart in their own separate neighborhoods, which came to be known as "Chinatowns".

F: Right. And in each of them the residents organized an unofficial government to make rules for the community and to settle disputes. To this day, certain Chinatowns, especially those of Francisco and New York, are busy, thriving communities.

M: Professor, there are two facts about the Chinese Americans: one is that there is so little juvenile delinquency among them; the other is that there are so many outstanding scholars, scientists, and artists out of their uneducated laborers ancestors. How can we explain these？

F: Well, we may owe little juvenile delinquency to their retaining many aspects of their ancient culture. For example, their family ties continue to be remarkably strong. Even young children cherish the old values and attitudes, including respect for their elders and a feeling of responsibility to the family. Secondly, the high regard for education which is deeply imbedded in Chinese culture, and the willingness to work very hard to gain advancement, are other noteworthy characteristics of theirs. This explains why so many descendants of laborers have succeeded in becoming doctors, lawyers, and other professionals.

How many Chinese Americans are there in the U.S. today？

A．Less than 500,000.

B．More than 500,000.

C．Less than 5,000,000.

D．More than 5,000,000,