Department: Ruskin

Ruskin felt that by drawing and studying feathers people would enter 'a new world of beauty’. He described too the difficulty of painting the ‘rainbow iridescence’ of peacock feathers without having ‘heaven to dip my brush in’. This study is typical of Ruskin’s interest in learning through concentrated observation, showing individual filaments from a single feather. He described them in detail: 'There are about thirty of these glowing filaments on each side (the whole being no larger across than a well-grown currant), and each of these is itself another exquisite feather, with central quill and lateral webs, whose filaments are not to be counted. The extremity of these breast plumes parts slightly into two, as you see in the peacock's, and many other such decorative ones.' Although Ruskin admired the exquisite beauty and even the practicality of a peacock's plumage, he was less sure about peacocks themselves. He described them as one of the most beautiful things on earth, but also the most useless.

Display Location: Millennium Gallery