What did realist artist like gustave courbet try to do with their art

lines and shapes are a part of the visual elements which can be played with and used to create a mood or feeling in a composition.

some of the other elements include the pattern, color, tone and texture. all these elements serve together as the construction blocks which are used by the artists to create artwork.

lines are used to form drawings and different shapes are formed when these lines are used in certain lengths or angles. so the artist can play with these elements of art to create and express different moods, thus conveying different  meanings.

photography had emerged as an elite art pursued by a few creative individuals for a few wealthy patrons. but now, said bauldelaire, it was succumbing to "the great industrial madness of our times." it was becoming a mass production industry that catered to middle-class tastes, including a taste for gadgetry. the stereoscope, the first 3d imaging system, had turned looking at photographs into parlor entertainment. a "thousand hungry eyes were bending over the peepholes of the stereoscope as though they were the attic-windows of the infinite.