pictorialism: Meaning and Definition of

pic•to•ri•al•ism

Pronunciation: (pik-tôr'ē-u-liz"um, -tōr'-), [key]
— n.
  1. the creation or use of pictures or visual images, esp. of recognizable or realistic representations.
  2. emphasis on purely photographic or scenic qualities for its own sake, sometimes with a static or lifeless effect:Cf. The movie's self-conscious pictorialism makes it little more than a travelogue.
Random House Unabridged Dictionary, Copyright © 1997, by Random House, Inc., on Infoplease.