We introduce a new model for the realization space of a matroid, which is obtained from a variety defined by a saturated determinantal ideal, called the slack ideal, coming from the vertex-hyperplane incidence matrix of the matroid. This is inspired by a similar model for the slack realization space of a polytope. We show how to use these ideas to certify non-realizability of matroids, and describe an explicit relationship to the standard Grassmann-Plücker realization space model. We also exhibit a way of detecting projectively unique matroids via their slack ideals by introducing a toric ideal that can be associated to any matroid.