Thanks for the question! So we’re being asked here for what would come closest to exemplifying the characteristics of Gilliam’s work as described in the passage. So what does the passage say about his work? Well, he was highly experimental and didn’t want to paint literally like the other African American artists at the time (around the end of the second paragraph). He would also explore a bunch of work with canvases like stained canvases or folded canvases or painted canvases, which would have “a third dimension and therefore a sculptural quality” (lines 47-48).
Now let’s take a look at (D), which tells us that the closest example is of a long unframed canvas painted with images of the sea and clouds and hung from a balcony to simulate the unfurling of sails. It’s true that this gets the canvas thing down. But the problem here is the representation: it’s way too literal and obvious. And that’s not what Gilliam would have wanted. So (D) isn’t going to be the right answer here.
Now let’s take a look at (E). A folded and crumpled canvas with many layers of colorful dripped and splashed paint interwoven with one another. This, again gets the canvas thing down. It’s also not literal at all since it’s just a bunch of colors. And this also basically mimics what the passage tells us that Gilliam himself did in lines 39-41, where “his early experiments included pouring paint onto stained canvases and folding canvases over onto themselves.” So (E) is going to be the closest, and therefore the correct answer.
Hope this helps! Feel free to ask any other questions that you might have.
