Ironic design
In addition to realism, we will also see a style of design that corresponds to another relationship between the viewer and the image. This relationship is like cool, self-conscious television (e.g. the Simpsons). In general self-conscious design encourages the viewer to look at the image rather than through it. It encourages the viewer to see a contrast between form and content and to be aware of form.
An example is Hotwired - just as Wired magazine tries to be cool in print. (The printed magazine tries too hard; its graphic design is so busy and self-referential that the viewer's only choices are to look through or to look away.) Graphic design in advertising is often realistic. But it is sometimes self-conscious and cool (e.g. on TV, the Energizer Bunny). More successful is a site like that of the advertising agency, Chiat/Day, which unabashedly combines information and self-promotion.
Self-conscious design presents the viewer with a variety of perspectives and encourages her to occupy each perspective in turn. On the web, these shifts of perspective can be accomplished by multiple links among pages. The pages themselves can have different graphically realized points of view.
Ironic web design will be an exercise in changing points of view.