---
title: Picture Alfie at the Tate Modern scoffing at a canvas of one colour:… — Modern art: "my little brother could do that" · tree and pragmatics
description: Picture Alfie at the Tate Modern scoffing at a canvas of one colour: copying it is easy now, but the artist was among the first to try the idea, and people still argue whether it is great art; both opinions are allowed. Who acts: you, Alfie, copying, artist. A sentence of the lesson «Modern art: "my
---

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# Modern art: "my little brother could do that", sentence 1

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Picture Alfie at the Tate Modern scoffing at a canvas of one colour: copying it is easy now, but the artist was among the first to try the idea, and people still argue whether it is great art; both opinions are allowed.

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**Who acts:** you, Alfie, copying, artist, people · **What happens:** picture, scoffing, copy, be, try, argue · **To what, where:** Alfie, canvas, colour, idea, great art, opinions · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of the lesson «Modern art: "my little brother could do that"» of the arts course of Mova's primary school. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (you, Alfie, copying, artist), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = school:arts:018-modern-art-my-little-brother-could-do-that.lesson:1
# text = Picture Alfie at the Tate Modern scoffing at a canvas of one colour: copying it is easy now, but the artist was among the first to try the idea, and people still argue whether it is great art; both opinions are allowed.
# source = school lesson (ours)
# course = arts
# lesson = 018-modern-art-my-little-brother-could-do-that.lesson
# annotation = Mova annot: Rust (en) → Haiku 5.5 (medium, Batches API) patches; gates UD 2.18; agreed by treeagree rules (Stanza, Trankit, spaCy trf): R5-strong ×2, R7-rel-agree ×1
1	Picture	picture	VERB	VB	Mood=Imp|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
2	Alfie	Alfie	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	1	obj	_	_
3	at	at	ADP	IN	_	7	case	_	_
4	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	6	det	_	Agree=R5-strong|Haiku=7:det
5	Tate	tate	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	6	compound	_	Agree=R5-strong|Haiku=7:compound|HaikuPos=NOUN:NN:Number=Sing
6	Modern	modern	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	7	amod	_	_
7	scoffing	scoffing	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	2	acl	_	_
8	at	at	ADP	IN	_	10	case	_	_
9	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
10	canvas	canvas	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	obl	_	_
11	of	of	ADP	IN	_	13	case	_	_
12	one	one	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	13	nummod	_	_
13	colour	colour	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	nmod	_	_
14	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	15	punct	_	_
15	copying	copy	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	18	csubj	_	_
16	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	15	obj	_	_
17	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	18	cop	_	_
18	easy	easy	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	1	parataxis	_	_
19	now	now	ADV	RB	_	18	advmod	_	_
20	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	27	punct	_	_
21	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	27	cc	_	_
22	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	23	det	_	_
23	artist	artist	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	27	nsubj	_	_
24	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	27	cop	_	_
25	among	among	ADP	IN	_	27	case	_	_
26	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	27	det	_	_
27	first	first	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos|NumForm=Word|NumType=Ord	18	conj	_	_
28	to	to	PART	TO	_	29	mark	_	_
29	try	try	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	27	acl	_	_
30	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	31	det	_	_
31	idea	idea	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	29	obj	_	_
32	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	36	punct	_	_
33	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	36	cc	_	_
34	people	people	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	36	nsubj	_	_
35	still	still	ADV	RB	_	36	advmod	_	_
36	argue	argue	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	27	conj	_	_
37	whether	whether	SCONJ	IN	_	41	mark	_	_
38	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	41	nsubj	_	_
39	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	41	cop	_	_
40	great	great	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	41	amod	_	_
41	art	art	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	36	ccomp	_	_
42	;	;	PUNCT	:	_	44	punct	_	_
43	both	both	DET	DT	PronType=Tot	44	det	_	_
44	opinions	opinion	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	46	nsubj:pass	_	_
45	are	be	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	46	aux:pass	_	_
46	allowed	allow	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	1	parataxis	_	Agree=R7-rel-agree|Haiku=1:conj
47	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	1	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .note -->
No stored speech act for this sentence.

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **picture** | imperative | you *not said here* | Alfie |  |  |  |  | vn characterize-29.2 «NP V NP S\_ING»: agent=Agent alfie=Theme |
| 2 | **scoffing** | gerund | Alfie *not said here* |  |  | a canvas of one colour |  |  | tree rules |
| 3 | **copy** | gerund |  | colour |  |  |  |  | vn scribble-25.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent it=Theme |
| 4 | **is** | present | copying |  |  |  | now | easy *property* | tree rules |
| 5 | **is** | past | the artist |  |  |  |  | first *property* | tree rules |
| 6 | **try** | to-infinitive |  | the idea |  |  |  |  | vn try-61.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent idea=Eventuality |
| 7 | **argue** *speech: disagree* | present | people |  |  |  | still |  | vn correspond-36.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 8 | **is a** | present | artist | great art |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 9 | **allow** | present · passive |  | both opinions |  |  |  |  | vn allow-64.1-1 «NP V NP»: subject=Beneficiary |

<!-- .note -->
One row per clause the reader finds. «not said here»: a role filled from the clause above. «roles by»: a VerbNet class and frame when one fits the verb, else the reader's rules on the tree.

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**Licence: [CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/)**, as the whole of Mova corpus 0.4, of which this treebank (the agreed school, `mova-school-agreed-en.conllu`) is part. The lessons were written for Mova's primary school. Sentence `school:arts:018-modern-art-my-little-brother-could-do-that.lesson:1`.

**The tree:** Mova annot: Rust (en) → Haiku 5.5 (medium, Batches API) patches; gates UD 2.18; agreed by treeagree rules (Stanza, Trankit, spaCy trf): R5-strong ×2, R7-rel-agree ×1. **The frames** are read from the tree by Mova's frames reader (`prag`) when this page is built, the lesson read in order, so a pronoun may be resolved from an earlier sentence.

See the [release 0.4](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/releases/0.4/).

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