“I am satisfied that you had no other course than to burn them, both for the sake of Turner”
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John Ruskin
John Ruskin 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.
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culture · English polymath (1819–1900) · writer · art critic · art historian · philosopher · painter · sociologist · university teacher · poet · literary critic · architect · also John Ruskin, Kata Phusin, Rŏsŭkʻin, J. Ruskin, John Rosukin, Jon Rasukin
Born 8 February 1819 · Died 20 January 1900 · Q179126
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2026· 4 entries
“the nocturne in black in gold is not in my opinion worth two hundred guineas”
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“is the teaching of all things.”
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“I can prove my virility at once.”
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2019· 7 entries
Hyperallergic: The Polymathic Mind of John Ruskin
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Wall Street Journal: ‘Unto This Last: Two Hundred Years of John Ruskin’ Review: Going to Nature in His Own Fashion
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The Guardian: A morning at Brantwood, the home of John Ruskin - archive, 30 January 1900
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The Guardian: Ruskin blazes and the Queen unleashes the end of the world – the week in art
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The Guardian: John Ruskin: The Power of Seeing review - oddball or visionary?
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Architectural Digest: John Ruskin's Influence on Art and Architecture on View in London Show
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Ruskin200 was inaugurated as a year-long celebration marking the bicentenary of Ruskin's birth
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2018· 2 entries
The Guardian: Ruskin the radical: why the Victorian critic is back with a vengeance
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archpaper: Don’t miss John Ruskin's art at Doge’s Palace in Venice
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2017· 1 entry
The Guardian: John Ruskin as artist – archive, 11 May 1904
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2015· 1 entry
Inspired by Ruskin's philosophy of education, Marc Turtletaub founded Meristem in Fair Oaks, California
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2006· 1 entry
Chris Smith, Baron Smith of Finsbury, Raficq Abdulla, Jonathon Porritt and Nicholas Wright were among those to contribute to the symposium, There is no wealth but life: Ruskin in the 21st Century
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2005· 1 entry
These works, which form part of the Turner Bequest held at Tate Britain, were re-appraised by Turner Curator Ian Warrell, who concluded that Ruskin and Wornum had not destroyed them
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2000· 1 entry
On the centenary of his death, and events are planned throughout 2019, to mark the bicentenary of his birth
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1934· 1 entry
As a memorial to Ruskin and remains open to the public today
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1932· 1 entry
By the educationist and Ruskin enthusiast, collector and memorialist, John Howard Whitehouse
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1919· 1 entry
But his reputation was already in decline and sank further in the fifty years that followed
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1912· 1 entry
By his friends Edward Tyas Cook and Alexander Wedderburn
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1900· 2 entries
Died 1900-01-20.
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In Toronto, Ontario, Canada), the oldest surviving club of its type, and still promoting the development of literary knowledge and public speaking today; and the Ruskin Art Club in Los Angeles, which still exists
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1899· 1 entry
(various Ruskin societies presenting him with an elaborately illuminated congratulatory address), Ruskin was scarcely aware of it
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1884· 1 entry
And he was announced to lecture at the Science Schools, by the park
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1879· 1 entry
Ruskin resigned from Oxford, a decision forced on him partly because of his declining health and finally precipitated by the Whistler trial
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1878· 1 entry
And at the Royal Society of Painters in Watercolour (of which he was an honorary member) in 1879
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1877· 2 entries
Ruskin said that in 1860, "I gave up my art work and wrote Unto This Last… the central work of my life" the break was not so dramatic or final
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“I gave up my art work and wrote Unto This Last… the central work of my life”
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1874· 2 entries
On his tour of Italy, Ruskin visited Sicily, the furthest he ever travelled
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And continuing into 1875, which involved undergraduates in a road-mending scheme
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1871· 5 entries
At Matlock, Derbyshire, a town and a county that he knew from his boyhood travels, whose flora, fauna, and minerals helped to form and reinforce his appreciation and understanding of nature
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(although originally it was called St George's Fund, and then St George's Company, before becoming the Guild in 1878)
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John Ruskin founded his own art school at Oxford, The Ruskin School of Drawing and Fine Art
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Began his monthly "letters to the workmen and labourers of Great Britain", published under the title Fors Clavigera (1871–1884)
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Career landmark: master (1871–1900).
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1870· 1 entry
At the Sheldonian Theatre to a larger-than-expected audience
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1869· 2 entries
Was one of the few occasions they came into personal contact
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Ruskin became the first Slade Professor of Fine Art at the University of Oxford, where he established the Ruskin School of Drawing
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1868· 1 entry
His tour took him to Abbeville, and in the following year he was in Verona (studying tombs for the Arundel Society) and Venice (where he was joined by William Holman Hunt)
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1864· 1 entry
Inherited an estate worth between £120,000 and £157,000 (the exact figure is disputed)
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1858· 3 entries
Ruskin was again travelling in Europe
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An institution from which the modern-day Anglia Ruskin University has grown
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Ruskin burned bundles of erotic paintings and drawings by Turner to protect Turner's posthumous reputation
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1857· 1 entry
Were collected as The Political Economy of Art and later under Keats's phrase, A Joy For Ever
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1856· 1 entry
“the expression of the spirits of great men”
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1851· 1 entry
Ruskin catalogued nearly 20,000 sketches that Turner gave to the British nation
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1845· 1 entry
At the age of 26, he undertook to travel without his parents for the first time
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1842· 1 entry
Ruskin sat for a pass degree, and was awarded an uncommon honorary double fourth-class degree in recognition of his achievements
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1839· 2 entries
When, at the third attempt, he won the prestigious Newdigate Prize for poetry (Arthur Hugh Clough came second)
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Ruskin's "Remarks on the Present State of Meteorological Science" was published in Transactions of the Meteorological Society
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1838· 1 entry
But Ruskin was disappointed by its appearance
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1836· 2 entries
Which had prompted Ruskin to write a long essay
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At King's College, London, where Dale was the first Professor of English Literature
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1835· 1 entry
Visited Venice for the first time, that 'Paradise of cities' that provided the subject and symbolism of much of his later work
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1834· 1 entry
Three short articles for Loudon's Magazine of Natural History were published
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1833· 1 entry
Visited Strasbourg, Schaffhausen, Milan, Genoa and Turin, places to which Ruskin frequently returned
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1819· 1 entry
Born 1819-02-08.
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1809· 1 entry
But opposition to the union from John Thomas, and the problem of his debts, delayed the couple's wedding
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