Magic realism

Magic realism is a term coined by the art historian and critic Franz Roh in 1925 to describe a strain of postwar European painting in which the world is depicted with emphatic clarity and realistic precision, yet with a sense of mystery, wonder or dreamlike estrangement. Unlike Surrealism, which released the unconscious and the illogical, magic realism preserves the clear, almost photographic distinctness of objects while endowing the ordinary with an aura of secrecy. Roh linked it to the New Objectivity (Neue Sachlichkeit) tendency in German art. The concept later spread to artists in various countries, including the American scene, and more widely still to literature, where magic realism became defining for Latin American prose. In painting, magic realism is distinguished by sharp detail, stillness, strange juxtapositions of familiar objects and a sense of muffled tension beneath the surface of the everyday. The tendency reflected a wish to return to the figurative after abstract and expressionist experiments, without losing modern anxiety.