A
I.M.Pei, the ChineseAmerican, who was regarded as one of the last great modernist architects, has died at the age of 102.
Although he worked mostly in the United States, Pei will always be remembered for a European project: His redevelopment of the Louvre Museum in Paris in the 1980s.He gave us the glass and metal pyramid in the main courtyard, along with three smaller pyramids and a vast subterranean (地下的) addition to the museum entrance.
Pei was the first foreign architect to work on the Louvre in its long history, and initially his designs were fiercely opposed.But in the end, the French — and everyone else — were won over.
Winning the fifth Pritzker Architecture Prize in 1983, he was thought as giving the 20th century “some of its most beautiful inside spaces and outside forms.His_talent_and_skill_in_the_use_of_materials_approach_the_level_of_poetry.”
After studying architecture at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard, Pei set up his own architectural practice in New York in 1955.
Designing the John F.Kennedy Presidential Library & Museum in 1964 established him as a name.His East Building of the National Gallery of Art in Washington in 1978 changed people's ideas of a museum.The site was an odd trapezoid (梯形) shape.Pei's solution was to cut it in two.The resulting building was dramatic, light and elegant — one of the first crowdpleasing cathedrals of modern art.
Though known as a modernist, and notable for his forms based on arrangements of simple geometric (几何的) shapes, he once urged Chinese architects to look more to their architectural tradition rather than designing in a western style.
In person, I.M.Pei was goodhumored, charming and unusually modest.His working process was evolutionary, but innovation (创新) was never an intended goal.
“Stylistic originality is not my purpose,” he said.“I want to find the originality in the time, the place and the problem.”
语篇解读:本文是一篇记叙文。文章主要讲述了被认为是最后一批伟大的现代主义建筑师之一的美籍华人贝聿铭的生平贡献。
1.What can we learn about the result of redevelopment of the Louvre Museum?
A.It was criticized by the French.
B.It turned out to be a success.
C.It made the Louvre Museum look strange.
D.It changed the function of the Louvre Museum.
解析:选B 细节理解题。根据第三段最后一句可知,人们认可了他的设计,他的设计最终证明是成功的。
2.What can we learn from the underlined sentence in Paragraph 4?
A.He is a master in applying materials.
B.He is skilled in writing poems.
C.He often combines poetry and construction.
D.He gets inspiration from poetry in designing.
解析:选A 句意理解题。根据前一句内容“he was thought as giving the 20th century ‘some of its most beautiful inside spaces and outside forms’”可知,画线句子是对前一句的进一步解释,即他的建筑风格像诗歌那样优美。此句赞颂了他高超的建筑造诣。
3.What's the correct order of the following events?
a.Design the John F.Kennedy Presidential Library & Museum.
b.Study architecture at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard.
c.Design the National Gallery of Art.
d.Win the fifth Pritzker Architecture Prize.
A.abcd B.bacd
C.bcad D.dacb
解析:选B 细节理解题。根据第四至六段的内容可知,a、b、c、d事件发生的时间分别为1964年、1955年、1978年和1983年,因此正确的排序为:bacd。