Description
Book SynopsisThis volume presents a collection of essays by leading experts which examine nineteenth century ideas about Christian theology, art, architecture, restoration, and curatorial practice. The volume unveils the importance of John Ruskin’s writing for today’s audience, and allies it with the dynamism of the Pre-Raphaelite religious imagination. Ruskin’s drawings and daguerreotypes, as well as Pre-Raphaelite paintings, stained glass, and engravings, are shown to be alive with visual theology: artists such as Dante Gabriel Rossetti, John Everett Millais, Edward Burne-Jones, and Evelyn de Morgan illuminate aspects of faith and aesthetics.
The interdisciplinary nature of this volume encourages reflection upon praise, truth, and beauty. The aesthetic conversations between Ruskin and the Pre-Raphaelites themselves become a form of ‘sacra conversazione’.
Table of ContentsContents
List of Illustrations
Note to Ruskin Referencing
List of Contributors
Acknowledgements
Introduction
Sheona Beaumont and Madeleine Emerald Thiele
Part One: Ruskin’s Sermons on Visual Theology
Earth and Heaven: Ruskin on Dirt, Work, and Beauty
Flora Armetta
Ruskin’s Venice: Embracing Sacred Fragments of Imperfect Beauty
Madeleine Emerald Thiele
‘Those are Leaves’: Ruskin’s Analogical Imagination and the Pre-Raphaelite Theology of Nature
Alison Millbank
Visual Interlude i: an Angelic Conversation
Sounds and Visions at The Chapel of St Michael and All Angels
Mark Dean and Sheona Beaumont
Part Two: Pre-Raphaelite Conversations with Ruskinian Truths
Ruskin, Rossetti, and the Sacra Conversazione of Colour
Elizabeth Helsinger
‘The Loveliest Traditions of the Christian Legend’: Ruskin, Burne-Jones, and the Imaging of the Cross
Katherine Hinzman
Crystal Balls: Visions of Creation in the Art of Burne-Jones
Suzanne Fagence Cooper
Visual Interlude ii: a Syncretic Communion
A World Without Ceiling: Mary Watts’s ‘Language of Symbols’ at Limnerslease
Lucy Ella Rose
Part Three: Reinvigorating Sacred Spaces
Victorian Exodus: Visualising the Old Testament in Dalziels’ Bible Gallery (1881)
Madeline Hewitson
Heaven on Earth: Evelyn De Morgan’s Rejection of Materialism
Sarah Hardy
Art on Sundays: Henrietta Barnett and the Whitechapel Fine Art Loan Exhibitions
Lucy Hartley
Envoi
Sheona Beaumont and Madeleine Emerald Thiele
Index
