The Elements of Drawing, John Ruskin’s teaching collection at Oxford

The Elements of Drawing, John Ruskin’s teaching collection at Oxford

Ruskin's Standard & Reference series (1872)

Exemplary works of art. In the catalogue of the Reference series, items marked 'M' are drawings "by my own Hand" (by Ruskin), P are photographs, E engravings and A by Ruskin's Assistant, Arthur Burgess.

Standard & Reference Cover

Ruskin's Catalogues: 1 object

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Ruskin assembled a diverse collection of artworks for his drawing school in Oxford, including watercolours by J.M.W. Turner and drawings by Ruskin himself.  He taught students to draw as a way of educating them in how to look at art and the world around them.  

Ruskin divided his Teaching Collection into four main series: Standard, Reference, Educational and Rudimentary. Each item was placed in a numbered frame, arranged in a set of cabinets, so that they all had a specific position in the Collection (although Ruskin often moved items about as his ideas changed). 

When incorporated into the Ashmolean’s collection in the last century, the works were removed from the frames and the sequence was lost.  Here, Ruskin's original catalogues, notes and instructions - in his chosen order and in his own words - are united with images of the works and links to modern curatorial descriptions.

Ruskin's Catalogues

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Santa Maria della Rosa, Lucca John Wharlton Bunney

  • Ruskin text

    81 Chapel of the Madonna of the Rose. Lucca. (This year, 1872, destroyed by plastering up its arches.)
  • Curator’s description:

    Description

    The drawing shows the chapel of Santa Maria della Rosa in Lucca, built in 1309 and enlarged in 1333, from the south-eastern corner (liturgically; the north-eastern as the chapel is actually arranged). The statue on the corner nearest the viewer shows the Virgin and Child.

    On 11 November 1866 Ruskin, concerned that Bunney had been developing bad habits in Florence, wrote to him and asked him to go to Lucca to draw Santa Maria della Rosa and the Guinigi palace. On 13 February, Ruskin again wrote to Bunney, saying that he had received the three drawings he had requested: 'I am entirely delighted with these drawings. They are exactly what I wanted and exquisitely careful, and laboriousy faithful and successfully laborious. You must be in "splendid health" to be able to do anything like them.' The three drawings were placed together in the Reference Series, where they were first catalogued in 1872.

    Although Ruskin did not comment explicitly on this drawing, in his lectures on sculpture in 1870 he noted how Santa Maria della Rosa, as well as Santa Maria della Spina in Pisa and the Madonna dei Miracoli in Venice, were the better for being small: 'the best buildings that I know are thus modest, and some of the best are minute jewel cases for sweet sculpture' (Aratra Pentelici, § 145 = XX.304). Ruskin was also concerned about the building's destruction by having its arches plastered up (Standard and Reference Series catalogue; cf. Library Edition, XXII.xxvi, where Ruskin is recorded as noting on 1 May 1872 that both Santa Maria della Rosa and Santa Maria della Spina had been 'destroyed').

    The statement in Cook and Wedderburn (XXI.33 n. 6) that all three of Bunney's Lucca drawings are 'dated January 1867' is incorrect.

  • Details

    Artist/maker
    John Wharlton Bunney (1828 - 1882)
    Object type
    drawing
    Material and technique
    graphite on wove paper
    Dimensions
    532 x 407 mm
    Associated place
    Inscription
    All in graphite.

    Recto:
    within the drawing, on the engraved plaque below the corner capital closest to the viewer: +AOI.ORE.DEI:ETBEA[T]E MARIE: | UIRG[IN]IS:DEROSA.HOC.OP[US].FAC|TU[M].EST.TPR+BIANCHI.BIEO | LCHI:LUPORO.UIUIARI:TRUCHO | RI.SPESIARUS+OPERAII.HUI | OPERIS.ANOM.CCC.UIIII+
    bottom left corner: 2
    bottom, to the right: Chapel of Santa Maria della Rosa Lucca Dec 66 - white marble.

    Verso:
    towards bottom right (recent): Ref 81 | 15-5-70 unmounted | Bunney
    just to the right, the Ruskin School's stamp
    Provenance

    Commissioned by John Ruskin in 1866; presented by John Ruskin to the Ruskin Drawing School (University of Oxford), 1875; transferred from the Ruskin Drawing School to the Ashmolean Museum, c.1949.

    No. of items
    1
    Accession no.
    WA.RS.REF.081
  • Subject terms allocated by curators:

    Subjects

    building

    chapel

    destruction

    smallness

  • References in which this object is cited include:

    References

    Ruskin, John, Catalogue of the Reference Series Including Temporarily the First Section of the Standard Series (London: Smith, Elder, [1872]), cat. Reference no. 81

    Ruskin, John, ‘The Ruskin Art Collection at Oxford: Catalogues, Notes and Instructions’, Edward T. Cook and Alexander Wedderburn, eds, The Works of John Ruskin: Library Edition, 39 (London: George Allen, 1903-1912), 21, cat. Reference no. 81

Location

    • Western Art Print Room

Position in Ruskin’s Collection

Ruskin's Catalogues

Arts and Humanities Research Council

University of Oxford

The Ruskin School of Drawing and Fine Art

Ashmolean

© 2013 University of Oxford - Ashmolean Museum