A verb tense question tests whether you can match a verb’s form to when something happens. Check that the forms agree with the subject, so you can focus on time. Read both sentences to find the blank’s own time clue, because the time can change. Present forms describe now, past forms describe earlier events, future forms look ahead, and had marks something already done by a later past moment. If no clue decides, match the verbs around the blank.
Hints
- Hint 1
Read the start of both sentences. What time clue appears in each?
- Hint 2
The blank describes the forms’ influence. Which sentence’s time clue applies to that influence?
Step-by-step
Follow the time clues
Step 1Check what can decide
The subject, these sculptural forms, names more than one form, so it’s plural. Do any of the choices fail to agree with it? Each verb form in the choices works with a plural subject. That means the answer turns on when the forms are influential, not on whether the verb fits the subject.
- Step 2
Separate the two time clues
During the 1950s tells us when Takaezu began creating the vessels. Does that date also set the time for their influence? The next sentence opens with Today, so the influence is described in the present, even though the sentence before it tells us about the artist’s work in the past.
- Step 3
Test the verb forms
Test the forms against Today: will remain points to the future, while remained places the influence in the past. Had remained puts it before another past moment. The present form remain states a fact about now and agrees with the plural subject. Choice D.