John Ruskin

Rocks. Copy after JMW Turner’s ‘Llanberis Lake and Snowdon, Caernarvon, Wales’

About this artwork

This is a copy of a detail from Llanberis Lake and Snowdon, Caernarvon, Wales by JMW Turner. John Ruskin made the drawing to be engraved as an illustration for his book, Modern Painters, which was published in five volumes between 1843 and 1860. Modern Painters was primarily written to advocate for Turner’s late work and to argue for the importance of truth to nature in his landscapes. This image was published under the title Rocks at Rest in the final volume. In the accompanying text, Ruskin wrote that ‘The Plate… is a portion of the drawing of the Llanberis… and interesting as showing the grace of Turner’s curvature even when he was drawing fastest… after finishing the rocks and water, being apparently a little tired, he has struck out the broken fence of the watering-place for the cattle with a few impetuous dashes of the hand. Yet the curvature and grouping of the line are still perfectly tender.’ Llanberis Lake and Snowdon, Caernarvon, Wales belonged to Henry Vaughan by 1854, so it is possible that Ruskin may have studied Turner’s watercolour while it was in Vaughan’s collection.

Published December 2023

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