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A Speculation On An Affinity Between Ruskin's Seven Lamps Of Architecture And Monet's Cathedrals, Elizabeth Teviotdale

Elizabeth C Teviotdale

Discusses John Ruskin’s architectural aesthetics and his view of the Gothic style as expressed in his Seven Lamps of Architecture. Discovers similarities between Ruskin’s ideas and the ideas and methods of Claude Monet, evident in his series of paintings of Rouen Cathedral, 1892-1895. Describes how Ruskin’s theories grew out of and advanced beyond the aesthetics of the Gothic revival movement, and how Monet’s paintings relate in a similar way to earlier 19th-century depictions of Gothic architecture. Ruskin’s redefinition of the picturesque is seen as the key to establishing a relationship between his theories and Monet’s paintings.