104 things from this book went into her brain. Here are the first 6.
John Ruskin held that children should be praised for effort and hard work, not for cleverness, because praise for cleverness teaches them to work for vanity.
John Ruskin argued that owning fewer things sharpens attention and makes the pleasure in them deeper.
John Ruskin warned against letting the demands of manufacture interfere with training the artist. Build the best skill first, then decide how to produce it at scale.
John Ruskin held that an artist's excellence rests on refined perception, which a good teacher can develop, while invention is a personal gift.
John Ruskin held that learning to see truly matters more than the drawing itself, and that seeing carefully is what lets us appreciate other people's work.
John Ruskin argued that a great skill is worth some tedious toil, and that nobody gains it while refusing to pay any price for it.
John Ruskin said the simple rules of perspective are too few and crude for subtle forms, so the eye must do the hard work and rules serve only as a rough aid.
John Ruskin said learning to draw is worth the effort when it has a real purpose, such as seeing beauty more clearly or understanding great work, rather than just looking accomplished.
John Ruskin believed almost anyone willing to pay the price of steady practice can learn to draw, because talent changes the speed of learning, not whether it is possible.
John Ruskin taught that the first thing to see in any subject is its broad patch of colour, before any texture or detail.
John Ruskin advised that doing two or three things perfectly teaches faster than doing many things badly.
John Ruskin advised learners to test each attempt against the original, find the faults and correct them patiently, rather than rushing on.
John Ruskin said the real difficulty of drawing is keeping the hand under full control at every part of a line, not making a sweep that only looks free.
John Ruskin urged students to look closely at ordinary things, such as the sky through a window or a white cup, to notice how light changes gradually across them.
John Ruskin argued that good work is usually done slowly, and that boldness meant as carelessness or show is a poor guide. He thought Nature itself is never bold at her work.
John Ruskin said the main point is that what we intend is right. If we see rightly and mean rightly we will get on, even if the hand staggers, so do not torment yourself over imperfect lines.
John Ruskin said the temptation in any work is to be slovenly, and that a deliberate check, like an outline, forces idle habits into precision.
John Ruskin said the jagged edges left in a practice exercise are an exact measure of your unskillfulness, so use them to see where to improve.
John Ruskin noted that even the best artists do not always get their work quite to their mind, and that they go back to touch it up.
John Ruskin said that if you can draw a simple stone well, with its roundness, you can draw most things, since nearly everything in nature is rounded.
John Ruskin held that true boldness comes from care and that ease in any skill rests on early precision. He said Nature will show you nothing if you set yourself up as her master.
John Ruskin said that when your work disappoints you, it is usually too coarse or too uneven rather than wrong. Make it more tender and true, and it will become more powerful.
John Ruskin said the best observer sees how a thing looks without needing reasons, and that a rule explained badly makes people caricature a third of nature and miss two-thirds.
John Ruskin mocked the painter who follows a rule like shadow is always darker, instead of painting what is really there, and the critic who then wonders why the hand looks so light.
John Ruskin said it is always dangerous to treat anything in art as a rule, and that the only way to find the truth is to look for it.
John Ruskin advised that a little bit finished well is worth more than many scrawls, and that when you feel yourself scrawling, you should stop and come back the next day.
John Ruskin said the greatest masters took pains over humble patterns, because learning to draw simple manufactured forms prepares you for the living world.
John Ruskin advised finishing a small area with full care rather than a large one carelessly, working steadily up to a marked limit so you always see what is done and what is not.
John Ruskin held that we must be right at whatever cost of pains, and that only then can we be right with freedom.
John Ruskin said that when work goes wrong it is usually refinement that is missing, not force. Fix errors slowly rather than rushing at them or rubbing out in despair.
John Ruskin said to keep the broad masses distinct before any detail, because we see the big shapes first, and that it is better to leave some detail unfinished than to lose the overall relations.
John Ruskin urged drawing whatever is actually there, background included, ugly or not, because only a complete and honest study shows whether you got it right.
John Ruskin urged a steady habit of careful study, several times a week, and looking at a subject from more than one side, since each view shows a different structure.
John Ruskin said to draw nothing more than you really see. Once you understand that, the difference between a careful drawing and a mere miniature comes down to honesty about what the eye sees.
John Ruskin held that technique is useless until you truly know the form. If you cannot draw a branch perfectly you will not draw a tree, so gain decisive form first and add method after.
John Ruskin said a beginner learns best by thinking long over a few good things, and that people who seem to know everything rarely know anything rightly. Beware of handbook knowledge.
John Ruskin said copying fine work reveals the real labour and skill behind it, and helps you understand how people must work when they have to do anything in this world.
John Ruskin advised that for an amateur it is better to err on the side of precision than vagueness, and to learn from more than one master.
John Ruskin said shorthand methods are only a way of recording an object in the time you have, not a display of your own cleverness, so keep trying to draw things rightly.
John Ruskin warned that you will not make a great drawing by copying a master's rough handling, because great work is economical, not hurried. Learn what he knew and felt first.
John Ruskin held that a good artist sees masses rather than edges, and can say more with rapid shade than with outline alone.
John Ruskin said that if you have no time to draw carefully, do not draw at all, because hasty marks waste your work and spoil your taste.
John Ruskin said that keeping order amid mystery is harder than creating mystery, so early practice should lean always to the definite side, keeping the eye true enough to find its way.
John Ruskin said we see only flat colours and learn to read them as light and shade. A good artist recovers the innocence of the eye and sees colours as they are.
John Ruskin said the aim is not a free hand but a right one, since a great master's swiftest touch is still under perfect control. There is no merit in doing wrong easily.
John Ruskin said that when a whole scene is too full to copy, judgment must choose what is principal or fleeting, and effort should go into concise methods that catch the characteristic points.
John Ruskin said the wise observer sees which way things are going, while the dunce draws everything as if it stood still. Great people in life and in art share this habit.
John Ruskin said there is no recipe for any subject. Look at the thing as it is, and do not draw from what someone told you to do with grass or stone.
John Ruskin said a quarter hour of true zeal and patience beats a whole day of sulky, inattentive labour, and that you should never work when you are tired.
John Ruskin said speed for its own sake, or dash for show, is harmful, but a quick and decisive hand can work alongside accuracy. Occasional practice at speed guards against slow, servile habits.
John Ruskin noted that at a distance the shadow is often more important than the thing casting it, and that a great painter reduces distant objects to their essential shadows.
John Ruskin warned that anxiety for a piece of work to look nice is fatal to progress. Care only that it is right and that you learn something while making it.
John Ruskin advised beginners to choose rough, worn and clumsy subjects over neat, polished ones, since the ugly things that look wrong at first often teach the most.
John Ruskin held that a pattern which is too uniform must be false, because individual variety is as true to nature as the unity of the whole. Any rule that makes every part alike has missed something.
John Ruskin argued that inferior work shows order only by giving up individuality, while great work keeps both order and difference. He thought the difference is what gives work its life.
John Ruskin warned that once the hand falls into a habit it runs on by itself, and that a good worker must stop and decide each mark, or the fingers become the master.
John Ruskin said we see nature only in fragments, so we should be humble about how well we understand the people around us. Much that seems clear turns out to be full of mystery on closer watching.
John Ruskin said the shortcuts commonly used for water are vain. Calm water holds a true picture of what is above it, and only patient drawing of the reflections gives a true effect.
John Ruskin said some things have no rule at all. For the true curve of a shore, only the instinct of an eye trained by long looking can judge what is right.
John Ruskin told students not to be frightened by complexity, nor to hope to render it in a hurry. Look well first and separate each part of the effect before drawing.
