Members Area Log In

The Collection

In his public letter's, Fors Clavigera, Ruskin wrote of his desire to make art and books available to everyone through a 'national store', and saw this idea through by opening the St George's Museum, in Walkley, a suburb of Sheffield in 1875. The museum and its collection of watercolours, drawings, prints, plaster casts, minerals, illustrated books, manuscripts and coins was intended to be an educational and creative resource for the metalworkers of Sheffield.

The artworks of the Collection of the Guild of St George pertain to Ruskin's thought and principles. Some were commissioned by Ruskin as memorandums for his writing before being given to the Guild, others including prints by J.M.W. Turner, and many  minerals, books and manuscripts were purchased by him for the Guild or passed though his own collections. From the 1890s, further works were acquired by the Guild's 'memorial fund', and the Guild still acquires for the collection today.

The St George's Museum, Walkley was extremely small, and the collection was redisplayed at larger premises at Meersbrook Park, Sheffield from 1890, before closing in 1953. After years in storage, the collection was brought back into public view at the Ruskin Gallery in Sheffield city centre in 1985. Today it is displayed as the Ruskin Collection at Sheffield's Millennium Gallery, and works from the collection can be viewed via Museums Sheffield's website.

Ruskin desired that the Collection of the Guild of St George should be seen in St George's Museums across England; however the Sheffield museum was, due to Ruskin's ill health, the only museum brought into fruition.

---