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Which medieval Italian painters did John Ruskin praise in Modern Painters?
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John Ruskin
John Ruskin, tinted lithograph published in London, c. 1880.
In his influential work Modern Painters, John Ruskin praised several medieval Italian painters whom he categorized as "Idealist" artists. He believed these figures offered an inspiring model for the "modern" age that later 17th- and 18th-century painters could not provide.1
The specific medieval Italian painters Ruskin highlighted include:
Ruskin wrote about these artists at the end of the second volume of Modern Painters and later included an account of them in the third edition of the first volume, published in 1846.1