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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Print of the Decoration on a Greek Crater, showing Poseidon with a Young Man and a Young Woman P. Bineteau

  • Ruskin text

    Beneath, as the Olympian deity.
  • Curator’s description:

    Description

    The lithograph shows Poseidon enthroned, holding his trident. Behind him stands a young woman holding a wreath; in front of him, a young man reaches out his hand to the god. It reproduces the decoration of a red-figure crater, then in the collection of the Duc de Luynes. It was plate IX in the third volume of Lenormant and de Witte's "Elite des monuments céramographiques", published in 1858. It was presumably taken from Ruskin's copy of the work now preserved in the Ruskin Library (inventory no. 1996B2621), which is missing many of its plates.

    The print was first catalogued by Ruskin in 1870, as no. 203 in the Standard Series, framed with another print from Lenormant and de Witte of a black-figure illustration of Neptune astride a sea-horse; they formed part of a series 'arranged chiefly with the view of showing the change in Greek conception of deity'. It retained its number in the 1871 catalogue of the Standard and Reference Series but, by the time Cook and Wedderburn were compiling their edition of the catalogues (published in 1906), the frame had been moved to no. 185. Cook and Wedderburn note (XXI.45 n. 1) that it carried its original number (203) on the edge of its frame, but the new number (185) on the face. Presumably, it was easier to engrave and attach a new ivory label on the edge of the frame than it was to remove or gild over the painted number on the face.

    Ruskin described the print as showing Poseidon 'as the Olympian deity'; its design was 'pure Greek, and very noble'.

    According to Ruskin, the change in the ancient Greek conception of deity took place between the sixth and fourth centuries BC, and was marked by a development from conceiving of the gods as embodiments of physical forces to individual, characterised intelligences; from active to passive figures; and from grotesque to deliberately-selected beautiful depictions. At the same time, ceramic decoration changed from painting black figures on the red ground to painting a black background, letting the red ground show through in the figures themselves - though this soon led to careless execution. He believed the best vases were red-figure vases produced just after the transition (Catalogue of Examples, pp. 25-27; Standard and Reference catalogue, pp. 28-30).

  • Details

    Artist/maker
    P. Bineteau (active c. 1857 - c. 1858) (printer)
    L. Petit (active c. 1858) (lithographer)
    Object type
    print
    Material and technique
    watercolour and bodycolour over lithograph on wove paper
    Dimensions
    213 x 306 mm (stone); 260 x 348 mm (sheet)
    Inscription
    All printed, around the image:
    top left: T. III.
    top right: PL. IX.
    bottom left corner: Lith. de P. Bineteau.
    bottom right corner: L. Petit, sc.

    Recto, bottom right, in ink, written down the page: 9

    Verso, bottom centre, the Ruskin School's stamp
    Provenance

    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.185.b
  • Subject terms allocated by curators:

    Subjects

    ceramic

    deity

    Greek

    man

    mythological subject

    woman

  • References in which this object is cited include:

    References

    Ruskin, John, Catalogue of Examples Arranged for Elementary Study in the University Galleries (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1870), cat. Standard no. 203

    Lenormant, Charles, and Jean de Witte, Elite des monuments céramographiques: Matériaux pour l'histoire des religions et des moeurs de l'antiquité, 4 vols in 8 (Paris: Leleux, 1844-1861), vol. III, pl. IX

    Ruskin, John, Catalogue of the Reference Series Including Temporarily the First Section of the Standard Series (London: Smith, Elder, [1872]), cat. Reference no. 203

    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. 185

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