Fill in the blanks with the most appropriate word in the following sentence.…
2025
Fill in the blanks with the most appropriate word in the following sentence.
The gallery has over 1,000 paintings. These ______ during the last 100 years.
- A.
have been collected
- B.
have collected
- C.
had been collected
- D.
had collected
Attempted by 34 students.
Show answer & explanation
Correct answer: A
Correct answer: have been collected
Explanation –
The sentence describes paintings that were gathered over a period extending up to the present (during the last 100 years). This calls for the present perfect passive.
Form and agreement: have/has + been + past participle. The determiner "these" is plural, so use "have". The past participle of "collect" is "collected", giving "have been collected."
Why the other choices are incorrect:
"have collected": active voice, which would imply the paintings did the collecting. The intended meaning requires passive voice (they were collected).
"had been collected": past perfect passive, used for actions completed before another past event. The phrase "during the last 100 years" refers to the period up to now, so present perfect passive is correct.
"had collected": past perfect active and illogical as the paintings cannot be the collectors; also wrong tense for the given time frame.