surrealist
surrealist Lexical Profile
surrealist Game Scores & Validity
• adjective
Relating to or characteristic of surrealism or its artists and writers.
"The museum is hosting a major retrospective of early surrealist cinema and photography."
Having a bizarre, dreamlike, or irrational quality reminiscent of surrealism.
"The novel features a surrealist landscape where clocks melt and trees speak in riddles."
• noun
An artist, writer, or thinker who is a member or proponent of the movement of surrealism, seeking to channel the unconscious mind to unlock the power of the imagination.
"Salvador Dalí and René Magritte are among the most famous surrealists of the twentieth century."
Word Nuance & Usage
While "surreal" is widely used in everyday speech to describe any bizarre or dreamlike experience, "surrealist" as an adjective more specifically refers to the 20th-century avant-garde artistic and literary movement or works directly inspired by its style.
• Rhymes for surrealist
• Nearby Words
Word Origin & Etymology
Borrowed in the 1920s from the French "surréaliste," derived from "surréalisme" (coined by the poet Guillaume Apollinaire in 1917), combining the prefix "sur-" (above, beyond) with "réalisme" (realism).