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BEST IELTS Academic Reading Test 158
IELTS ACADEMIC READING TEST 158 – PASSAGE – 1
IELTS ACADEMIC READING TEST – 158
READING PASSAGE – 1
RED IN RUSSIAN ART
A. In Old Slavonic, a language that precedes Russian, ‘red’ has a similar root to the words ‘good’ and ‘beautiful’. Indeed, until the 20th century, Krasnaya Ploshchad, or Red Square, in central Moscow, was understood by locals as ‘Beautiful Square’. For Russians, red has great symbolic meaning, being associated with goodness, beauty, warmth, vitality, jubilation, faith, love, salvation, and power.
B. Because red is a long-wave colour at the end of the spectrum, its effect on a viewer is striking: it appears closer than colours with shorter waves, like green, and it also intensifies colours placed alongside it, which accounts for the popularity of red and green combinations in Russian painting.
C. Russians love red. In the applied arts, it predominates bowls, boxes, trays, wooden spoons, and distaffs for spinning all feature red, as do children’s toys, decorative figurines, Easter eggs, embroidered cloths, and garments. In the fine arts, red, white, and gold form the basis of much icon painting.
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D. In pre-Christian times, red symbolised blood. Christianity adopted the same symbolism; red represented Christ or saints in their purification or martyrdom. The colour green, meantime, signified wisdom, while white showed a person reborn as a Christian. Thus, in a famous 15th-century icon from the city of Novgorod, Saint George and the Dragon, red-dressed George sports a green cape, and rides a pure-white stallion.
In many icons, Christ and the angels appear in a blaze of red, and the mother of Christ can be identified by her long red veil. In an often-reproduced icon from Yaroslavl, the Archangel Michael wears a brilliant red cloak. However, the fires of Hell that burn sinners are also red, like those in an icon from Pskov.
E. A red background for major figures in icons became the norm in representations of mortal beings, partly to add vibrancy to skin tones, and one fine example of this is a portrait of Nikolai Gogol, the writer, from the early 1840s. When wealthy aristocrats wished to be remembered for posterity, they were often depicted in dashing red velvet coats, emulating the cloaks of saints, as in the portraits of Jakob Turgenev in 1696, or of Admiral Ivan Talyzin in the mid-1760s. Portraits of women in Russian art are rare, but the Princess Yekaterina Golitsyna, painted in the early 1800s, wears a fabulous red shawl.
Common people do not appear frequently in Russian fine art until the 19th century when their peasant costumes are often white with red embroidery, and their elaborate headdresses and scarves are red. The women in the 1915 painting, Visiting, by Abram Arkhipov seem aflame with life: their dresses are red; their cheeks are red; and, a jug of vermillion lingonberry cordial glows on the table beside them.
Russian avant-garde painters of the early 20th century are famous beyond Russia as some of the greatest abstract artists. Principal among these are Nathan Altman, Natalia Goncharova, Wassily Kandinsky, and Kazimir Malevich, who painted the ground-breaking White on white as well as Red Square, which is all the more compelling because it isn’t quite square. Malevich used primary colours, with red prominent, in much of his mature work.
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Kuzma Petrov-Vodkin is hailed as a genius at home, but less well-known abroad; his style is often surreal, and his palette is restricted to the many hues of red, contrasting with green or blue. The head in his 1915 Head of a youth is entirely red, while his 1925 painting, Fantasy, shows a man in blue, on a larger-than-life all-red horse, with a blue town in blue mountains behind.
F. Part of the enthusiasm for red in the early 20th century was due to the rise of the political movement, communism. Red had first been used as a symbol of revolution in France in the late 18th century. The Russian army from 1918-45 called itself the Red Army to continue this revolutionary tradition, and the flag of the Soviet Union was the Red Flag.
Soviet poster artists and book illustrators also used swathes of red. Some Social Realist painters have been discredited for their political associations, but their art was potent, and a viewer cannot help but be moved by Nikolai Rutkovsky’s 1934 Stalin at Kirov’s coffin. Likewise, Alexander Gerasimov’s 1942 Hymn to October or Dmitry Zhilinsky’s 1965 Gymnasts of the USSR stand on their own as memorable paintings, both of which include plenty of red.
G. In English, red has many negative connotations – red for debt, a red card for football fouls, or a red-light district – but in Russian, red is beautiful, vivacious, spiritual, and revolutionary. And Russian art contains countless examples of its power.
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Questions 1-6
Reading Passage 1 on the following page has seven sections: A-G.
Choose the correct heading for sections B-G from the list of headings below.
Write the correct number, i-x, in boxes 1-6 on your answer sheet.
List of Headings
i. The uses of red
ii. Russian and English views of red
iii. Red and beauty
iv. The optics of red
v. Red and religion
vi. The hazards of red
vii. Red and politics
viii. Portrait painters who copied icons
ix. Red and art
x. Revolutionary painters
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1. Section B
2. Section C
3. Section D
4. Section E
5. Section F
6. Section G
Questions 4-7
Choose ONE WORD OR A NUMBER from the passage for each answer.
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Russian Applied Arts
| Household goods: | Red wooden objects, toys, figurines, & embroidered (7)……….. |
| Garments: | Red coats, dresses, headdresses, shawls & scarves |
| Russian Fine Arts | |
| Painting: Icon | • Red, white & gold = main colours • (8)………. – century Novgorod icon of St George in red • Christ, saints, angels & mother of Christ in red • Fires of Hell = red |
| Portrait | • 1840s Gogol painted with red (9)…………. , like figures in icons • 1696 Turgenev & mid-1760s Talyzin in red coats, like saints’ cloaks • 1800s Princess Golitsyna in a red shawl • 1915 Visiting = peasant women & lots of red |
| Abstract | • Painters famous worldwide: Altman, Goncharova & Kandinsky • Malevich’s White on white & Red Square = impressive |
| Surrealist | • Petrov-Vodkin famous in Russia • 1915 Head of a (10)……….. = head all red • 1925 Fantasy = blue man on a huge red horse |
| Social (11)……… | • Lots of red in Rutkovsky’s 1934 Stalin at Kirov’s coffin • Gerasimov’s 1942 Hymn to October • Zhilinsky’s (12)………. Gymnasts of the USSR |
Question 13
Choose TWO letters: A-E.
The list below includes associations Russians make with the colour red.
Which TWO are mentioned by the writer of the passage?
A. danger
B. wealth
C. intelligence
D. faith
E. energy
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ANSWERS ARE BELOW
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ANSWERS
1. iv
2. i
3. v
4. ix
5. vii
6. ii
7. CLOTHS
8. 15TH/FIFTEENTH
9. BACKGROUND
10. YOUTH
11. REALISM
12. 1965
13. D&E
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