Realism

"The social and political upheavals of the mid nineteenth century gave birth to a movement which rejected all idealization in art and literature in order to depict concrete contemporary reality. Desire for democracy in the arts opened up a new range of subjects, previously considered unworthy of representation. This book discusses the acute social awareness and preoccupation with actuality in the art and literature of the western world - notably in the revolutionary paintings of Courbet, in the works of Manet, Degas and Monet, of the Pre-Raphaelites and other English, American, German and Italian realists."--