Choosing Images for the Mock Written Paper
The EB Art teacher is drafting a 90-minute mock written paper on the theme Art and Power. The paper needs four works, at least two media, at least one non-European work, and at least one pre-1900 work. Candidates have studied: a 16th-century Benin bronze plaque; a 1940 Nazi propaganda film still; a 1930 Soviet propaganda poster; a 2024 AI-generated portrait of a politician; Goya's Third of May, 1814; and a 2019 protest banner from Hong Kong. One candidate is from a family affected by the Holocaust; another is a Hong Kong Chinese student. Image rights for the AI portrait and the banner are unclear. The teacher wants comparison, not recall.
1. Select four works and justify the selection in terms of exam validity, balance, and sensitivity.
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Select the Benin bronze plaque, Goya's Third of May, the Soviet propaganda poster, and the AI-generated portrait. This gives two pre-1900 works and one non-European work; four media (cast metal, painting, printed poster, digital image); and four different mechanisms of power: colonial display, resistance to occupation, mass mobilisation, and algorithmic authority. The Nazi film still is relevant but should be excluded from this timed mock: it centres perpetrator imagery, may distress a candidate with family history, and can crowd out analysis of how power is contested. The Hong Kong banner should also be excluded from this paper because image rights are unclear and the candidate's personal connection could make the prompt feel like a test of loyalty. Exclusion from one mock is not erasure from the course; both can be taught with proper framing later. The paper should state that works are reproduced for educational comparison and that candidates may analyse without identifying with the positions shown.
2. Write one comparative question that requires judgement rather than recall, and explain how the marking would reward reasoning.
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A suitable question is: 'Compare how two of the four works construct authority or resistance through composition, medium, and intended audience. To what extent does their original context still determine their meaning today?' This requires selection, visual analysis, contextual argument, and evaluation. A recall-only answer would list dates and facts. A strong answer would, for example, compare the frontal, symmetrical display of the Benin plaque with the diagonal, anti-heroic composition of Goya, then argue that the plaque's meaning has changed through colonial acquisition and museum display. Marking should reward accurate visual evidence, use of appropriate terms, justified contextual claims, and recognition of competing interpretations. Candidates should be allowed to disagree about which work is most powerful, provided the argument is evidenced. The mark scheme should separate knowledge, analysis, and evaluation so that a candidate who knows many facts but makes no judgement cannot score highly. A short unseen quotation about power and images could be added to prevent prepared answers.