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John Ruskin (1819–1900)
Rocks in Unrest
Watercolor, point of brush, scratching out, over pencil
7 5/16 x 12 1/8 in. (185 x 308 mm)
Inscribed in border, in pen and brown ink, at lower left, Drawn from my favorite St. Gothard, for Mod. Painters 4^th vol. / (J. Ruskin Brantwood. 23^d Aug. 86)
Thaw Collection; EVT 159
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Ruskin learned to draw by copying the works of Samuel Prout and David Roberts and studying under Anthony Vandyke Copley Fielding. Turner, however, would prove the greatest influence. Ruskin built a sizeable collection of Turner's early watercolors. The first volume of Ruskin's Modern Painters resulted from his reading a negative review of Turner's work. This drawing is a copy of the lower part of the Turner watercolor The Pass at Faido, St. Gotthard, which Ruskin commissioned. His own drawing of a detail of the Turner work is reproduced as plate 81 in the final volume of Modern Painters.

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