• Realism (arts), the depiction of subjects as they appear in everyday life
• Realism (theatre), a movement towards greater fidelity to real life
• Realism (visual arts), a style of painting that depicts what the eye can see
• American realism, a turn of the 20th century idea in arts
• Classical Realism, an artistic movement in late 20th Century that valued beauty and artistic skill
• Hyperrealism (painting), a genre of painting that resembles high resolution photography
• Kitchen sink realism, an English cultural movement in the 1950s and 1960s that concentrated on contemporary social realism
• Literary realism, a 19th century literary movement
• Magic realism, an artistic genre in which magical elements appear in an otherwise realistic setting
• Nazi heroic realism or the art of the third Reich, a style of propaganda art associated with Nazi Germany
• Neorealism, a movement emphasising realism in cinema and literature
• New Realism, an artistic movement founded in 1960 by Pierre Restany and Yves Klein
• Poetic realism, a film movement in France in the 1930s that used heightened aestheticism
• Photorealism, a genre of painting that resembles photography
• Pseudorealism, a genre of art initiated by Indian artist Devajyoti Ray where reality is approached via abstraction.
• Pseudorealism, a term coined by American film critics, used to describe films in which digital unreal images are created and amalgamated with regular scenes thereby creating an illusion that is difficult to distinguish from reality.
• Romantic realism, an aesthetic art term popularized by writer/philosopher Ayn Rand
• Social realism, an artistic movement which depicts working class activities
• Socialist realism, a style of propaganda art associated with Communism