Butterfly is a 1988 painting by the Japanese artist Ay-O. Like many of Ay-O's paintings, Butterfly, which portrays a swimmer...

Let's begin by understanding the meaning of this sentence. We'll use our understanding of pause points and segment the sentence as shown - understanding and assimilating the meaning of each segment bit by bit!

Sentence Structure

• Butterfly is a 1988 painting by the Japanese artist Ay-O.
• Like many of Ay-O's paintings,
• Butterfly,
  • which portrays a swimmer performing the butterfly stroke,
  • attempts to make use of the entire visual light spectrum[?]
    • sporting rainbow-striped goggles,
    • the rainbow-hued swimmer splashes through a wavy rainbow of water.

Understanding the Meaning

The first sentence gives us background:

• 'Butterfly is a 1988 painting by the Japanese artist Ay-O.'
  • So we're talking about a specific work of art.

Now the second sentence tells us something about this painting:

• 'Like many of Ay-O's paintings,'
  • This painting is similar to the artist's other work.
• 'Butterfly, which portrays a swimmer performing the butterfly stroke,'
  • Quick note: the painting shows someone swimming the butterfly stroke.
• 'attempts to make use of the entire visual light spectrum'
  • This is the key point - the painting tries to use the full range of colors in the visible spectrum.

This is where we have the blank. Let's look at the choices:

• A: spectrum (nothing)
• B: spectrum: (colon)
• C: spectrum while
• D: spectrum, while

To see what works here, let's read the rest of the sentence and understand what it's saying!

The sentence continues:

• 'sporting rainbow-striped goggles, the rainbow-hued swimmer splashes through a wavy rainbow of water.'

Now let's really understand what this part is telling us:

• 'sporting rainbow-striped goggles'
  • describes the swimmer - wearing goggles with rainbow stripes
• 'the rainbow-hued swimmer'
  • the swimmer is colored with rainbow colors
• 'splashes through a wavy rainbow of water'
  • even the water is depicted as a rainbow

So the complete picture is:

• The painting shows a swimmer who is rainbow-colored, wearing rainbow goggles, splashing through rainbow water.

What do we notice about the structure here?

• Before the blank: 'Butterfly attempts to make use of the entire visual light spectrum'
  • This is a complete thought - it has a subject (Butterfly) and tells us what the painting does.
• After the blank: 'the rainbow-hued swimmer splashes through a wavy rainbow of water'
  • This is also a complete thought - it has a subject (swimmer) and verb (splashes).

But here's the key relationship:

• The second part is showing us exactly HOW the painting uses the visual spectrum
  • It's not just telling us it uses the spectrum - it's demonstrating it by describing all the rainbow elements
  • Rainbow goggles + rainbow swimmer + rainbow water = using the full spectrum!

When you have one complete thought that explains or illustrates what the previous complete thought said, you need a colon.

So we need spectrum: (Choice B).

The colon introduces the explanation of how the painting achieves its goal of using the entire visual spectrum.

GRAMMAR CONCEPT APPLIED

Using a Colon to Introduce an Explanation or Illustration

When you have a complete thought followed by another complete thought that explains, illustrates, or provides examples of what you just said, you can use a colon (called an explanatory colon in grammar terms) to connect them:

Pattern:

• First complete thought: Makes a statement or claim
• Colon
• Second complete thought: Explains, illustrates, or provides examples

Example 1:

• Statement: "The storm caused serious damage"
• Colon introducing explanation: "The storm caused serious damage: three houses lost their roofs and the power was out for days."
• The second part shows specifically what "serious damage" means

Example 2:

• Statement: "She had one goal for the summer"
• Colon introducing explanation: "She had one goal for the summer: she would learn to play the guitar."
• The second part reveals what that goal is

In this question:

• Statement: "Butterfly attempts to make use of the entire visual light spectrum"
• Colon introducing illustration: "sporting rainbow-striped goggles, the rainbow-hued swimmer splashes through a wavy rainbow of water"
• The second part demonstrates exactly HOW the painting uses the spectrum - by depicting rainbow elements throughout