surrealism
[suh-ree-uh-liz-uh m]
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noun (sometimes initial capital letter)
a style of art and literature developed principally in the 20th century, stressing the subconscious or nonrational significance of imagery arrived at by automatism or the exploitation of chance effects, unexpected juxtapositions, etc.
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Nearby words
- surprisingly,
- surra,
- surratt,
- surratt, mary eugenia,
- surreal,
- surrealist,
- surrealistic,
- surreality,
- surreally,
- surrebuttal
Origin of surrealism
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2019
Examples from the Web for surrealism
surrealism
noun
Word Origin for surrealism
C20: from French surréalisme, from sur- 1 + réalisme realism
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition
© William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
surrealism
1927, from French surréalisme (from sur- "beyond" + réalisme "realism"), coined c.1917 by Guillaume Apollinaire, taken over by Andre Breton as the name of the movement he launched in 1924 with "Manifeste de Surréalisme." Taken up in English at first in the French form; the anglicized version is from 1931.
De cette alliance nouvelle, car jusqu'ici les décors et les costumes d'une part, la chorégraphie d'autre part, n'avaient entre eux qu'un lien factice, il este résulté, dans 'Parade,' une sorte de surréalisme. [Apollinaire, "Notes to 'Parade' "]
Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper
surrealism
A movement in art and literature that flourished in the early twentieth century. Surrealism aimed at expressing imaginative dreams and visions free from conscious rational control. Salvador Dali was an influential surrealist painter; Jean Cocteau was a master of surrealist film.
The New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition
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