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87-478: Located on the confluence of three canals, it is thus an unusual structure in that it presents three facades rather than the customary one. Ca' Cappello is a grand palace of Gothic origin, but substantially restructured during the course of the sixteenth century under the direction of its owner, the procurator of Saint Mark Antonio Cappello , who had supervised some of the most important projects of construction and renovation in sixteenth-century Venice, in particular

174-487: A boy of his age. He was profoundly affected by Samuel Rogers 's poem Italy (1830), a copy of which was given to him as a 13th birthday present; in particular, he deeply admired the accompanying illustrations by J. M. W. Turner . Much of Ruskin's own art in the 1830s was in imitation of Turner, and of Samuel Prout , whose Sketches Made in Flanders and Germany (1833) he also admired. His artistic skills were refined under

261-582: A close "scientific" observer of nature, especially its geology. From September 1837 to December 1838, Ruskin's The Poetry of Architecture was serialised in Loudon's Architectural Magazine , under the pen name "Kata Phusin" (Greek for "According to Nature"). It was a study of cottages, villas, and other dwellings centred on a Wordsworthian argument that buildings should be sympathetic to their immediate environment and use local materials. It anticipated key themes in his later writings. In 1839, Ruskin's "Remarks on

348-546: A fairy story. During a six-week break at Leamington Spa to undergo Dr Jephson's (1798–1878) celebrated salt-water cure, Ruskin wrote his only work of fiction, the fable The King of the Golden River (not published until December 1850 (but imprinted 1851), with illustrations by Richard Doyle ). A work of Christian sacrificial morality and charity, it is set in the Alpine landscape Ruskin loved and knew so well. It remains

435-417: A fairy tale . He also made detailed sketches and paintings of rocks, plants, birds, landscapes, architectural structures and ornamentation. The elaborate style that characterised his earliest writing on art gave way in time to plainer language designed to communicate his ideas more effectively. In all of his writing, he emphasised the connections between nature, art and society. Ruskin was hugely influential in

522-568: A father originally from Hertfordshire . His wife, Margaret Cock (1781–1871), was the daughter of a publican in Croydon . She had joined the Ruskin household when she became companion to John James's mother, Catherine. John James had hoped to practise law, and was articled as a clerk in London. His father, John Thomas Ruskin, described as a grocer (but apparently an ambitious wholesale merchant),

609-786: A friend of Keats (whose son, Arthur Severn, later married Ruskin's cousin, Joan). He was galvanised into writing a defence of J. M. W. Turner when he read an attack on several of Turner's pictures exhibited at the Royal Academy . It recalled an attack by the critic Rev John Eagles in Blackwood's Magazine in 1836, which had prompted Ruskin to write a long essay. John James had sent the piece to Turner, who did not wish it to be published. It finally appeared in 1903. Before Ruskin began Modern Painters , John James Ruskin had begun collecting watercolours, including works by Samuel Prout and Turner. Both painters were among occasional guests of

696-449: A gentleman, and the other an operative; whereas the workman ought often to be thinking, and the thinker often to be working, and both should be gentlemen, in the best sense. As it is, we make both ungentle, the one envying, the other despising, his brother; and the mass of society is made up of morbid thinkers and miserable workers. Now it is only by labour that thought can be made healthy, and only by thought that labour can be made happy, and

783-415: A gift of God". In defining categories of beauty and imagination, Ruskin argued that all great artists must perceive beauty and, with their imagination, communicate it creatively by means of symbolic representation. Generally, critics gave this second volume a warmer reception, although many found the attack on the aesthetic orthodoxy associated with Joshua Reynolds difficult to accept. In the summer, Ruskin

870-564: A good friend (he called him "Brother Ned"). His father's disapproval of such friends was a further cause of tension between them. During this period Ruskin wrote regular reviews of the annual exhibitions at the Royal Academy with the title Academy Notes (1855–1859, 1875). They were highly influential, capable of making or breaking reputations. The satirical magazine Punch published the lines (24 May 1856), "I paints and paints,/hears no complaints/And sells before I'm dry,/Till savage Ruskin/He sticks his tusk in/Then nobody will buy." Ruskin

957-585: A painting that was considered blasphemous at the time, but Ruskin wrote letters defending the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood to The Times during May 1851. Providing Millais with artistic patronage and encouragement, in the summer of 1853 the artist (and his brother) travelled to Scotland with Ruskin and Effie where, at Glen Finglas , he painted the closely observed landscape background of gneiss rock to which, as had always been intended, he later added Ruskin's portrait . Millais had painted

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1044-492: A passion for the works of Byron , Shakespeare and especially Walter Scott . They visited Scott's home, Abbotsford , in 1838, but Ruskin was disappointed by its appearance. Margaret Ruskin, an evangelical Christian, more cautious and restrained than her husband, taught young John to read the Bible from beginning to end, and then to start all over again, committing large portions to memory. Its language, imagery and parables had

1131-473: A picture of Effie for The Order of Release, 1746 , exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1852. Suffering increasingly from physical illness and acute mental anxiety, Effie was arguing fiercely with her husband and his intense and overly protective parents, and sought solace with her own parents in Scotland. The Ruskin marriage was already undermined as she and Millais fell in love, and Effie left Ruskin, causing

1218-530: A point of drawing the Ca' d'Oro and the Doge's Palace, or Palazzo Ducale , because he feared that they would be destroyed by the occupying Austrian troops. One of these troops, Lieutenant Charles Paulizza, became friendly with Effie, apparently with Ruskin's consent. Her brother, among others, later claimed that Ruskin was deliberately encouraging the friendship to compromise her, as an excuse to separate. Meanwhile, Ruskin

1305-513: A profound and lasting effect on his writing. He later wrote: She read alternate verses with me, watching at first, every intonation of my voice, and correcting the false ones, till she made me understand the verse, if within my reach, rightly and energetically. Ruskin's childhood was spent from 1823 at 28 Herne Hill (demolished c.  1912 ), near the village of Camberwell in South London . He had few friends of his own age, but it

1392-734: A property investment fund in exchange for a 1957 former state electricity company edifice. The swap has aroused considerable criticism and investigative weekly L'Espresso has noted the absence of a public auction and problems connected with an apparent violation - only supposed - with Italian heritage law, that forbids the swap of listed property. The chancellor Carlo Carraro has defended the operation on budget grounds, arguing it will help stave off large cuts to scholarships and research funding. 45°26′10″N 12°19′48″E  /  45.4362°N 12.3301°E  / 45.4362; 12.3301 Procurators of San Marco The office of Procurator of Saint Mark ( Venetian : Procurador de San Marco)

1479-471: A public scandal. During April 1854, Effie filed her suit of nullity , on grounds of "non-consummation" owing to his "incurable impotency ", a charge Ruskin later disputed. Ruskin wrote, "I can prove my virility at once." The annulment was granted in July. Ruskin did not even mention it in his diary. Effie married Millais the following year. The complex reasons for the non-consummation and ultimate failure of

1566-487: Is buried in the churchyard of St John the Evangelist, Shirley, Croydon. Ruskin was born on 8 February 1819 at 54 Hunter Street, Brunswick Square , London (demolished 1969), south of what is now St Pancras railway station . His childhood was shaped by the contrasting influences of his father and mother, both of whom were fiercely ambitious for him. John James Ruskin helped to develop his son's Romanticism . They shared

1653-643: Is reputed to have been designed by him. Originally placed in the St. Peter's Church Duntisbourne Abbots near Cirencester , the window depicts the Ascension and the Nativity. Ruskin's theories also inspired some architects to adapt the Gothic style . Such buildings created what has been called a distinctive "Ruskinian Gothic". Through his friendship with Henry Acland , Ruskin supported attempts to establish what became

1740-542: The "Manchester School" of economists , as represented by a hostile review in the Manchester Examiner and Times . As the Ruskin scholar Helen Gill Viljoen noted, Ruskin was increasingly critical of his father, especially in letters written by Ruskin directly to him, many of them still unpublished. Ruskin gave the inaugural address at the Cambridge School of Art in 1858, an institution from which

1827-626: The Alps , and in 1835 visited Venice for the first time, that 'Paradise of cities' that provided the subject and symbolism of much of his later work. These tours gave Ruskin the opportunity to observe and record his impressions of nature. He composed elegant, though mainly conventional poetry, some of which was published in Friendship's Offering . His early notebooks and sketchbooks are full of visually sophisticated and technically accomplished drawings of maps, landscapes and buildings, remarkable for

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1914-606: The Art Treasures Exhibition , Manchester in 1857, were collected as The Political Economy of Art and later under Keats 's phrase, A Joy For Ever . In these lectures, Ruskin spoke about how to acquire art, and how to use it, arguing that England had forgotten that true wealth is virtue, and that art is an index of a nation's well-being. Individuals have a responsibility to consume wisely, stimulating beneficent demand. The increasingly critical tone and political nature of Ruskin's interventions outraged his father and

2001-696: The Church of Saint Mark and its treasury), de citra (responsible for trust funds established in the sestieri (districts) of San Marco , Castello , and Cannaregio ), and de ultra (responsible for trust funds established in the sestieri of San Polo , Santa Croce , and Dorsoduro ). Beginning in 1516, initially to aid in the economic recovery from the War of the League of Cambrai , supernumerary procurators could also be created in moments of financial constraint in exchange for monetary contributions to

2088-523: The Lake District (his first long poem, Iteriad , was an account of his tour in 1830) and to relatives in Perth , Scotland. As early as 1825, the family visited France and Belgium . Their continental tours became increasingly ambitious in scope: in 1833 they visited Strasbourg , Schaffhausen , Milan , Genoa and Turin , places to which Ruskin frequently returned. He developed a lifelong love of

2175-650: The Oxford University Museum of Natural History (designed by Benjamin Woodward ) — which is the closest thing to a model of this style, but still failed to satisfy Ruskin completely. The many twists and turns in the Museum's development, not least its increasing cost, and the University authorities' less than enthusiastic attitude towards it, proved increasingly frustrating for Ruskin. The Museum

2262-559: The Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood in 1848. The Pre-Raphaelite commitment to 'naturalism' – "paint[ing] from nature only", depicting nature in fine detail, had been influenced by Ruskin. Ruskin became acquainted with Millais after the artists made an approach to Ruskin through their mutual friend Coventry Patmore . Initially, Ruskin had not been impressed by Millais's Christ in the House of His Parents (1849–50),

2349-696: The historic preservation of St. Mark's Basilica. John Ruskin John Ruskin (8 February 1819 – 20 January 1900) was an English polymath – a writer, lecturer, art historian, art critic , draughtsman and philanthropist of the Victorian era . He wrote on subjects as varied as art, architecture, political economy , education, museology , geology, botany , ornithology , literature, history, and myth. Ruskin's writing styles and literary forms were equally varied. He wrote essays and treatises , poetry and lectures, travel guides and manuals, letters and even

2436-622: The "Old Lecturer". On the surface a discourse on crystallography, it is a metaphorical exploration of social and political ideals. In the 1880s, Ruskin became involved with another educational institution, Whitelands College , a training college for teachers, where he instituted a May Queen festival that endures today. (It was also replicated in the 19th century at the Cork High School for Girls.) Ruskin also bestowed books and gemstones upon Somerville College , one of Oxford 's first two women's colleges , which he visited regularly, and

2523-595: The "truths" of water, air, clouds, stones, and vegetation, a profound appreciation of which Ruskin demonstrated in his own prose. He described works he had seen at the National Gallery and Dulwich Picture Gallery with extraordinary verbal felicity. Although critics were slow to react and the reviews were mixed, many notable literary and artistic figures were impressed with the young man's work, including Charlotte Brontë and Elizabeth Gaskell . Suddenly Ruskin had found his métier, and in one leap helped redefine

2610-655: The German empress consort Victoria . Writing about Lady Layard in 1898 her friend Lady Gregory remembered that “the emperor [the Kaiser, son of empress Victoria] passed this house [Ca Cappello] recognized Lady Layard on the balcony and touched his hat two or three times”. In 1911 the Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany and Lord Kitchener even held private meetings in Ca Cappello. The death of Lady Layard in 1912 and

2697-740: The Present State of Meteorological Science" was published in Transactions of the Meteorological Society . In Michaelmas 1836, Ruskin matriculated at the University of Oxford , taking up residence at Christ Church in January of the following year. Enrolled as a gentleman-commoner , he enjoyed equal status with his aristocratic peers. Ruskin was generally uninspired by Oxford and suffered bouts of illness. Perhaps

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2784-565: The Ruskin marriage are a matter of enduring speculation and debate. Ruskin continued to support Hunt and Rossetti . He also provided an annuity of £150 in 1855–1857 to Elizabeth Siddal , Rossetti's wife, to encourage her art (and paid for the services of Henry Acland for her medical care). Other artists influenced by the Pre-Raphaelites also received both critical and financial assistance from Ruskin, including John Brett , John William Inchbold , and Edward Burne-Jones , who became

2871-461: The Ruskins at Herne Hill, and 163 Denmark Hill (demolished 1947) to which the family moved in 1842. What became the first volume of Modern Painters (1843), published by Smith, Elder & Co. under the anonymous authority of "A Graduate of Oxford", was Ruskin's answer to Turner 's critics. Ruskin controversially argued that modern landscape painters—and in particular Turner—were superior to

2958-570: The Victorian poet Robert Browning , of whose poetic abilities Lady Layard had a low opinion, and the historian Horatio Brown , as well as local nobles such as countess Annina Morosini , supposedly the most beautiful woman in Venice at the time, but whom Lady Layard found “vulgar”. Royalty acknowledged the Layards, and Lady Enid in particular enjoyed a special relationship with queen Alexandra and

3045-700: The commencement of work on Rialto bridge , the edification of the Biblioteca Nazionale Marciana and the supervision of the construction of the Golden staircase at Ducal Palace or the redecoration of the room of the Council of Ten within the palace. For these important works Antonio had frequently commissioned painters Paolo Veronese and Giovanni Battista Zelotti , to who he had ties through common friend Michele Sanmicheli. Veronese and Zelotti were thus commissioned to decorate with frescoes

3132-570: The decline of true Christian faith. Instead of revering the divine, Renaissance artists honoured themselves, arrogantly celebrating human sensuousness. The chapter, "The Nature of Gothic" appeared in the second volume of Stones . Praising Gothic ornament, Ruskin argued that it was an expression of the artisan's joy in free, creative work. The worker must be allowed to think and to express his own personality and ideas, ideally using his own hands, rather than machinery. We want one man to be always thinking, and another to be always working, and we call one

3219-519: The edification of St. George’s Anglican church in Venice , where glass windows commemorate the founder. The death of Austen Henry Layard did not interrupt social activity, and his widow, Lady Enid, maintained an equally intense social activity in the palazzo. The intense social activity around the salon of Austen Henry Layard and his wife Enid is recorded in Lady Layard’s diary. Frequent visitors included art historians John Ruskin and Giovanni Morelli ,

3306-433: The erudite Marco Boschini noted surviving but damaged work by Zelotti, and wrote that much had already been lost in a fire. The deities painted by Zelotti were however still visible in 1760 when Anton Maria Zanetti printed his Varie Pitture a Fresco de principali maestri Veneziani , and reproduced in engravings the four surviving figures. It is not certain when these remaining and worn out frescoes were finally lost, but by

3393-594: The exception of the Doge's Palace , the procurators de supra were also specifically responsible for the construction, maintenance, and management of the public buildings around Saint Mark's Square , including the shops, food stalls, and apartments that were rented out as sources of revenue. The Procurators' offices , called ridotti , were located on the upper floor of the Marciana Library in Saint Mark's Square. The office of Procurator of St Mark's

3480-484: The financial administration of the Church of Saint Mark, its upkeep, and its decoration as well as its treasury. The other two procurators, called de subtus super commissariis , administered trust funds established as pious donations on behalf of religious and charitable institutions. In 1319, there were six procurators, and in 1443 there were nine. These were divided into three procuracies: de supra (responsible for

3567-500: The first volume of Modern Painters (1843), an extended essay in defence of the work of J. M. W. Turner in which he argued that the principal duty of the artist is "truth to nature". This meant rooting art in experience and close observation. From the 1850s, he championed the Pre-Raphaelites , who were influenced by his ideas. His work increasingly focused on social and political issues. Unto This Last (1860, 1862) marked

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3654-568: The founders' politics, he strongly supported the idea that through education workers could achieve a crucially important sense of (self-)fulfilment. One result of this involvement was Ruskin's Elements of Drawing (1857). He had taught several women drawing, by means of correspondence, and his book represented both a response and a challenge to contemporary drawing manuals. The WMC was also a useful recruiting ground for assistants, on some of whom Ruskin would later come to rely, such as his future publisher, George Allen . From 1859 until 1868, Ruskin

3741-510: The genre of art criticism, mixing a discourse of polemic with aesthetics, scientific observation and ethics. It cemented Ruskin's relationship with Turner. After the artist died in 1851, Ruskin catalogued nearly 20,000 sketches that Turner gave to the British nation. Ruskin toured the continent with his parents again during 1844, visiting Chamonix and Paris , studying the geology of the Alps and

3828-778: The geology of the Alps in terms of landscape painting, and their moral and spiritual influence on those living nearby. The contrasting final chapters, "The Mountain Glory" and "The Mountain Gloom" provide an early example of Ruskin's social analysis, highlighting the poverty of the peasants living in the lower Alps. In addition to leading more formal teaching classes, from the 1850s Ruskin became an increasingly popular public lecturer. His first public lectures were given in Edinburgh, in November 1853, on architecture and painting. His lectures at

3915-674: The greatest advantage of his time there was in the few, close friendships he made. His tutor, the Rev Walter Lucas Brown, always encouraged him, as did a young senior tutor, Henry Liddell (later the father of Alice Liddell ) and a private tutor, the Reverend Osborne Gordon . He became close to the geologist and natural theologian William Buckland . Among his fellow undergraduates, Ruskin's most important friends were Charles Thomas Newton and Henry Acland . His most noteworthy success came in 1839 when, at

4002-493: The latter half of the 19th century and up to the First World War . After a period of relative decline, his reputation has steadily improved since the 1960s with the publication of numerous academic studies of his work. Today, his ideas and concerns are widely recognised as having anticipated interest in environmentalism , sustainability , ethical consumerism , and craft . Ruskin first came to widespread attention with

4089-594: The modern-day Anglia Ruskin University has grown. In The Two Paths (1859), five lectures given in London, Manchester , Bradford and Tunbridge Wells , Ruskin argued that a 'vital law' underpins art and architecture, drawing on the labour theory of value . (For other addresses and letters, Cook and Wedderburn, vol. 16, pp. 427–87.) The year 1859 also marked his last tour of Europe with his ageing parents, during which they visited Germany and Switzerland . Ruskin had been in Venice when he heard about Turner's death in 1851. Being named an executor to Turner's will

4176-562: The most significant work being the Portrait of Mehmet II by Gentile Bellini . Because of Layard’s particular standing, the palazzo quickly became a meeting place for “the greatest representatives of British and international cultural, political and diplomatic intelligentsia between the final quarter of the 19th century and the first decade of the XXth”. The Layards quickly rose amongst a thriving expat community in Venice, their patronage ensuring

4263-479: The most translated of all his works. Back at Oxford, in 1842 Ruskin sat for a pass degree, and was awarded an uncommon honorary double fourth-class degree in recognition of his achievements. For much of the period from late 1840 to autumn 1842, Ruskin was abroad with his parents, mainly in Italy. His studies of Italian art were chiefly guided by George Richmond , to whom the Ruskins were introduced by Joseph Severn ,

4350-607: The nation by the artist. This involved Ruskin in an enormous amount of work, completed in May 1858, and involved cataloguing, framing and conserving. Four hundred watercolours were displayed in cabinets of Ruskin's own design. Recent scholarship has argued that Ruskin did not, as previously thought, collude in the destruction of Turner's erotic drawings, but his work on the Bequest did modify his attitude towards Turner. (See below, Controversies: Turner's Erotic Drawings .) In 1858, Ruskin

4437-474: The nineteenth century they were certainly no longer visible. Ca Cappello was purchased, at a date given variously as 1874 and 1878 by sources, by the English archeologist, diplomat and politician Austen Henry Layard, with the help of the doyen of the British community in Venice, the historian Rawdon Brown . Layard, who had shipped his great collection of Italian Renaissance paintings to Venice in 1875, inhabited

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4524-408: The ninth century with a single procurator operis Sancti Marci , nominated to assist the doge in the administration of the Church of Saint Mark , the ducal chapel. Over time the number of procurators increased. A second was created in 1231 and a third in 1259. After 1261, there were four procurators, two of which, the procurators de supra (Ecclesiam sancti Marci) , retained responsibility for

4611-480: The obligation incumbent upon all nobles to accept political appointments, including on the Venetian mainland and in the overseas possessions , thus ensuring their presence in the city. The position also brought economic and financial influence through the management of vast amounts of capital and of investments in commercial and private real estate, in government bonds , and in securities and deposits . With

4698-540: The office. The first procurator was chosen by the doge. But after 1231, the procurators were elected by the Great Council . In addition to the associated public honour, the office of procurator ensured an active role in the political life of Venice: after 1453, it guaranteed a seat in the Senate with the right to vote. Apart from extraordinary embassies to foreign courts, the procurators were also relieved from

4785-512: The outbreak of the war saw an end to Ca Cappello’s role as a leading literary and social salon in Venice. It was later acquired by the Carnelutti family, before passing in 1967 into the possession of the University of Venice Ca’ Foscari . It is currently the object of a controversial swap operation that would see it transferred, together with sixteenth-century palace Ca Bembo and the modern Palazzo Cosulich, two other university properties, to

4872-614: The paintings of Titian , Veronese and Perugino among others at the Louvre . In 1845, at the age of 26, he undertook to travel without his parents for the first time. It provided him with an opportunity to study medieval art and architecture in France, Switzerland and especially Italy. In Lucca he saw the Tomb of Ilaria del Carretto by Jacopo della Quercia , which Ruskin considered the exemplar of Christian sculpture (he later associated it with

4959-478: The palazzo an unmistakable appearance. Assyrian reliefs from Nineveh and a Hellenistic funerary piece from Samos were installed into the staircase wall, though these were in 1892 donated to the Museo Civico Correr , and replaced with floral paintings by Neapolitan artist Francesco Lavagna . More significant was the collection of paintings assembled by the Layards in a gallery in the palazzo, with

5046-523: The palazzo stably following his withdrawal from the diplomatic career after political debacle in Istanbul and deep disagreement with Gladstone until his death by cancer, on the occasion of a rare visit to London, in 1894. The frescoes by Zelotti and Veronese were no longer visible, but Layard managed significant renovation works in the palace. Red, yellow and green felt covered the walls inside, and Spanish silks festooned outside of balconies and windows gave

5133-804: The renovated Renaissance palace. The fresco cycle was noted by Giorgio Vasari as one of Veronese’s notable works “who painted with the same [Zelotti] the façade of the palace of M. Antonio Cappello that is in Venice overlooking the Grand Canal”. The frescoes were more extensively described by erudite Carlo Ridolfi in his 1648 Le Meraviglie dell’arte , “over the Grand Canal in the house of the Cappelli Veronese coloured some figures of Cerere, Pomona, Pallas and other deities. The figures above were painted by his friend Zelotti”. The cycle did not survive long. In his 1674 Miniere della Pittura Veneziana

5220-417: The residence of the Ruskin family. It was the site of the suicide of John Thomas Ruskin (Ruskin's grandfather). Owing to this association and other complications, Ruskin's parents did not attend. The European Revolutions of 1848 meant that the newlyweds' earliest travels together were restricted, but they were able to visit Normandy , where Ruskin admired the Gothic architecture . Their early life together

5307-737: The school in Peckham run by the progressive evangelical Thomas Dale (1797–1870). Ruskin heard Dale lecture in 1836 at King's College, London , where Dale was the first Professor of English Literature. Ruskin went on to enrol and complete his studies at King's College , where he prepared for Oxford under Dale's tutelage. Ruskin was greatly influenced by the extensive and privileged travels he enjoyed in his childhood. It helped to establish his taste and augmented his education. He sometimes accompanied his father on visits to business clients at their country houses, which exposed him to English landscapes, architecture and paintings. Family tours took them to

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5394-443: The second daughter of his father's business partner, had become engaged to a French nobleman. In April 1840, whilst revising for his examinations, he began to cough blood, which led to fears of consumption and a long break from Oxford travelling with his parents. Before he returned to Oxford, Ruskin responded to a challenge that had been put to him by Effie Gray , whom he later married: the twelve-year-old Effie had asked him to write

5481-512: The shift in emphasis. In 1869, Ruskin became the first Slade Professor of Fine Art at the University of Oxford , where he established the Ruskin School of Drawing . In 1871, he began his monthly "letters to the workmen and labourers of Great Britain", published under the title Fors Clavigera (1871–1884). In the course of this complex and deeply personal work, he developed the principles underlying his ideal society. Its practical outcome

5568-571: The so-called " Old Masters " of the post- Renaissance period. Ruskin maintained that, unlike Turner, Old Masters such as Gaspard Dughet (Gaspar Poussin), Claude , and Salvator Rosa favoured pictorial convention, and not "truth to nature". He explained that he meant "moral as well as material truth". The job of the artist is to observe the reality of nature and not to invent it in a studio—to render imaginatively on canvas what he has seen and understood, free of any rules of composition. For Ruskin, modern landscapists demonstrated superior understanding of

5655-739: The then object of his love, Rose La Touche ). He drew inspiration from what he saw at the Campo Santo in Pisa , and in Florence . In Venice , he was particularly impressed by the works of Fra Angelico and Giotto in St Mark's Cathedral , and Tintoretto in the Scuola di San Rocco , but he was alarmed by the combined effects of decay and modernisation on the city: "Venice is lost to me", he wrote. It finally convinced him that architectural restoration

5742-437: The third attempt, he won the prestigious Newdigate Prize for poetry ( Arthur Hugh Clough came second). He met William Wordsworth , who was receiving an honorary degree, at the ceremony. Ruskin's health was poor and he never became independent from his family during his time at Oxford. His mother took lodgings on High Street, where his father joined them at weekends. He was devastated to hear that his first love, Adèle Domecq,

5829-473: The treasury. This amounted to the periodic sale of the prestigious title. The number of procurators fluctuated thereafter: in 1521, there were eighteen. At times, the number rose to forty. The effective sale of the position also made it possible for young and ambitious nobles to quickly rise to high office and to consequently exert great influence. In the sixteenth century, notably Antonio Cappello , Vettore Grimani, Federico Contarini, and Andrea Dolfin purchased

5916-653: The tutelage of Charles Runciman, Copley Fielding and J. D. Harding . Ruskin's journeys also provided inspiration for writing. His first publication was the poem "On Skiddaw and Derwent Water" (originally entitled "Lines written at the Lakes in Cumberland: Derwentwater" and published in the Spiritual Times ) (August 1829). In 1834, three short articles for Loudon 's Magazine of Natural History were published. They show early signs of his skill as

6003-484: The two cannot be separated with impunity. This was both an aesthetic attack on, and a social critique of, the division of labour in particular, and industrial capitalism in general. This chapter had a profound effect, and was reprinted both by the Christian socialist founders of the Working Men's College and later by the Arts and Crafts pioneer and socialist William Morris . John Everett Millais , William Holman Hunt and Dante Gabriel Rossetti had established

6090-423: The virtues of a secular and Protestant form of Gothic. It was a challenge to the Catholic influence of architect A. W. N. Pugin . In November 1849, John and Effie Ruskin visited Venice , staying at the Hotel Danieli. Their different personalities are revealed by their contrasting priorities. For Effie, Venice provided an opportunity to socialise, while Ruskin was engaged in solitary studies. In particular, he made

6177-444: Was abroad again with his father, who still hoped his son might become a poet, even poet laureate , just one among many factors increasing the tension between them. During 1847, Ruskin became closer to Euphemia "Effie" Gray , the daughter of family friends. It was for her that Ruskin had written The King of the Golden River . The couple were engaged in October. They married on 10 April 1848 at her home, Bowerswell , in Perth , once

6264-820: Was again travelling in Europe. The tour took him from Switzerland to Turin , where he saw Paolo Veronese 's Presentation of the Queen of Sheba at the Galleria Sabauda . He would later claim (in April 1877) that the discovery of this painting, contrasting starkly with a particularly dull sermon that he had listened to at a Waldensian church in Turin, led to his "unconversion" from Evangelical Christianity . He had, however, doubted his Evangelical Christian faith for some time, shaken by Biblical and geological scholarship that

6351-961: Was an art-philanthropist: in March 1861 he gave 48 Turner drawings to the Ashmolean in Oxford , and a further 25 to the Fitzwilliam Museum , Cambridge in May. Ruskin's own work was very distinctive, and he occasionally exhibited his watercolours: in the United States in 1857–58 and 1879, for example; and in England, at the Fine Art Society in 1878, and at the Royal Society of Painters in Watercolour (of which he

6438-545: Was an honorary member) in 1879. He created many careful studies of natural forms, based on his detailed botanical, geological and architectural observations. Examples of his work include a painted, floral pilaster decoration in the central room of Wallington Hall in Northumberland, home of his friend Pauline Trevelyan . The stained glass window in the Little Church of St Francis Funtley, Fareham, Hampshire

6525-548: Was an honour that Ruskin respectfully declined, but later took up. Ruskin's book in celebration of the sea, The Harbours of England , revolving around Turner's drawings, was published in 1856. In January 1857, Ruskin's Notes on the Turner Gallery at Marlborough House , 1856 was published. He persuaded the National Gallery to allow him to work on the Turner Bequest of nearly 20,000 individual artworks left to

6612-440: Was an incompetent businessman. To save the family from bankruptcy, John James, whose prudence and success were in stark contrast to his father, took on all debts, settling the last of them in 1832. John James and Margaret were engaged in 1809, but opposition to the union from John Thomas, and the problem of his debts, delayed the couple's wedding. They finally married, without celebration, in 1818. John James died on 3 March 1864 and

6699-539: Was destruction, and that the only true and faithful action was preservation and conservation. Drawing on his travels, he wrote the second volume of Modern Painters (published April 1846). The volume concentrated on Renaissance and pre-Renaissance artists rather than on Turner. It was a more theoretical work than its predecessor. Ruskin explicitly linked the aesthetic and the divine, arguing that truth, beauty and religion are inextricably bound together: "the Beautiful as

6786-563: Was involved with the progressive school for girls at Winnington Hall in Cheshire. A frequent visitor, letter-writer, and donor of pictures and geological specimens to the school, Ruskin approved of the mixture of sports, handicrafts, music and dancing encouraged by its principal, Miss Bell. The association led to Ruskin's sub-Socratic work, The Ethics of the Dust (1866), an imagined conversation with Winnington's girls in which he cast himself as

6873-631: Was making the extensive sketches and notes that he used for his three-volume work The Stones of Venice (1851–53). Developing from a technical history of Venetian architecture from the Byzantine to the Renaissance, into a broad cultural history, Stones represented Ruskin's opinion of contemporary England. It served as a warning about the moral and spiritual health of society. Ruskin argued that Venice had degenerated slowly. Its cultural achievements had been compromised, and its society corrupted, by

6960-700: Was not abolished at the fall of the Republic of Venice in 1797. Instead, the Procurators remained responsible for administering the assets of St. Mark's Basilica, under the authority of the Patriarch of Venice . The position was confirmed by a royal decree issued by Victor Emmanuel III of Italy in 1931. Today, there are seven procurators, with the president holding the title of First Procurator of St Mark's ( Primo Procuratore di San Marco ). The Procurators work closely with architects and engineers to ensure

7047-403: Was not the friendless and joyless experience he later said it was in his autobiography, Praeterita (1885–89). He was educated at home by his parents and private tutors, including Congregationalist preacher Edward Andrews, whose daughters, Mrs Eliza Orme and Emily Augusta Patmore were later credited with introducing Ruskin to the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood . From 1834 to 1835 he attended

7134-505: Was one of the few lifetime appointments in the government of the Venetian Republic and was considered second only to that of the doge in prestige. It was routinely occupied by nobles belonging to the most influential families and typically represented the climax of a distinguished political career, although it was often an intermediate position prior to election as doge. The office of procurator of Saint Mark originated in

7221-527: Was part of a wider plan to improve science provision at Oxford, something the University initially resisted. Ruskin's first formal teaching role came about in the mid-1850s, when he taught drawing classes (assisted by Dante Gabriel Rossetti ) at the Working Men's College , established by the Christian socialists , Frederick James Furnivall and Frederick Denison Maurice . Although Ruskin did not share

7308-430: Was similarly generous to other educational institutions for women. Both volumes III and IV of Modern Painters were published in 1856. In MP III Ruskin argued that all great art is "the expression of the spirits of great men". Only the morally and spiritually healthy are capable of admiring the noble and the beautiful, and transforming them into great art by imaginatively penetrating their essence. MP IV presents

7395-548: Was spent at 31 Park Street, Mayfair , secured for them by Ruskin's father (later addresses included nearby 6 Charles Street, and 30 Herne Hill). Effie was too unwell to undertake the European tour of 1849, so Ruskin visited the Alps with his parents, gathering material for the third and fourth volumes of Modern Painters . He was struck by the contrast between the Alpine beauty and the poverty of Alpine peasants, stirring his increasingly sensitive social conscience. The marriage

7482-506: Was the founding of the Guild of St George , an organisation that endures today. Ruskin was the only child of first cousins. His father, John James Ruskin (1785–1864), was a sherry and wine importer, founding partner and de facto business manager of Ruskin, Telford and Domecq (see Allied Domecq ). John James was born and brought up in Edinburgh , Scotland, to a mother from Glenluce and

7569-626: Was unhappy, with Ruskin reportedly being cruel to Effie and distrustful of her. The marriage was never consummated and was annulled six years later in 1854. Ruskin's developing interest in architecture, and particularly in the Gothic , led to the first work to bear his name, The Seven Lamps of Architecture (1849). It contained 14 plates etched by the author. The title refers to seven moral categories that Ruskin considered vital to and inseparable from all architecture: sacrifice, truth, power, beauty, life, memory and obedience. All would provide recurring themes in his future work. Seven Lamps promoted

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