Julia Margaret Cameron

Answer choices

1. A

   No Impact2% picked this

   Sitting for a painting typically takes much longer than sitting for

   This definitely provides a distinction between the two formats, but the distinction doesn't have any common sense link to suspension of disbelief. It's more about how the art is created than about how the art is consumed/perceived.

   2%
2. B

   Deepens Paradox29% picked this

   Paintings, unlike photographs, can depict obviously

   I actually like this answer, but I think LSAC intended it to be the reverse of what we're looking for. They're thinking, "if paintings are known for obviously impossible situations, then wouldn't you go into consuming a painting with more skepticism that what you're seeing is real?" To me, though, it's a coherent idea to think that when you're consuming a media that is known for obviously impossible situations (like cartoons), your standards of realism are automatically suspended. In other words, it's easier to suspend disbelief when you never were expecting realism in the first place.

   29%
3. C

   No Impact2% picked this

   All of the sitters for a painting do not have to be present at

   Like (A), this is talking about the process of making the painting / photo. It doesn't have anything to do with the art consumer's faculties of realism / disbelief while perceiving it.

   2%
4. D

   Correct65% picked this

   A painter can suppress details about a sitter that are at odds with

   Why this is right

   This answer doesn't explicitly provide a distinction between paintings and photos, but common sense would tell us that a photograph (in the era prior to Photoshop) shows everything the light touches. A photographer can of course manipulate lighting and the angle of her shot to obscure certain things she doesn't want in the frame. But seeing a photo of someone pretending to be Jesus, if that person has some gray hair, or a funky nose, or a scar on their face, it would be hard to hide that sort of thing from the camera's eye, and it would be a jarring thing for the art consumer to see. (yikes, I don't remember Jesus with gray hair and a scar!) Meanwhile, a painter is adding every layer and detail by choice. If she's painting the same gray-haired, scarred dude as her Jesus, she can keep his hair all brown and omit the scar and she paints his face. So there's a selectivity the painter has that is more flexible than what a photographer has. The fewer elements a painting/photo has that are at odds with the imaginary persona, the easier it would be to accept the painting/photo as a realistic rendering of the imaginary persona.

   Skill tested: Strengthen · how this choice captures the passage's function is the move to repeat next time.

   65%
5. E

   Deepens Paradox, if anything2% picked this

   Paintings typically bear the stylistic imprint of an artist, school,

   This doesn't as clearly draw a distinction between paintings and photos, but the distinction it does draw feels like one that would take us out of being immersed in the narrative / historical setting of the painting. If I'm looking at a painting that's supposed to be a rendering of The Last Supper, but then I become aware that is comes from the Impressionist school/period, it might take me out of the biblical scene and make my brain aware that I'm seeing an Impressionistic take on the Last Supper.

   2%