Fig. 1.

A natural landscape of wildflowers, evergreen trees and mountains photographed at Glacier National Park in Montana USA. The top image has had its details removed to illustrate a half completed instrumentalist painting of the landscape. The bottom image contains all details but only part of the picture is visible, the rest is blank canvas: this is the half-completed realist painting. In this example we are reminded of the difference between ‘realism’ and ‘impressionism’ in art where the latter was a more recent advance that was initially met with substantial criticism