John Ruskin Quotes

... there are shadows because there are hills.

Its when the sun shines the brightest that our shadows appear the biggest

Clouds are no deterrent. Clouds intensify the drama, trap and shape the light.

What I wanted to do was to paint sunlight on the side of a house.

Shadows sometimes people don't see shadows. The Chinese of course never paint them in pictures, oriental art never deals with shadow. But I noticed these shadows and I knew it meant it was sunny.

I always think of shade as being full of light. That is why I like to use the word shade rather than light and shadow. Shade seems to play over the thing, envelop it, better define it, while shadow seems to fall on the thing and stain the surface with darks.

Look closely at the Japanese; they draw admirably and yet in them you will see life outdoors and in the sun without shadows.

Fading light buttered the ridges until shadows licked them clean and they were lost to nightfall.

Out of sight above the house, the mirror moon reflected the sun of a day not yet dawned, shining the pale light of tomorrow on the yard and on the paper birches.

Is not light grander than fire?

But thou that didst appear so fair To fond imagination, Dost rival in the light of day Her delicate creation.

As I walked briskly out the road the wind knifed at my face, but this sun caressed the back of my neck.

The eye is always caught by light, but shadows have more to say.

Study your subject through half-closed eyes before starting to draw - you'll find that the lights and darks are exaggerated and easier to identify.

A luminous body will appear more brilliant in proportion as it is surrounded by deeper shadow.

The star shines for everyone in the world, but in reality, it itself is surrounded in darkness.

I see only forms that are lit up and forms that are not. There is only light and shadow.

See the gold sunshine patching, And streaming and streaking across The gray-green oaks; and catching, By its soft brown beard, the moss.

The trees bathed their great heads in the waves of the morning, while their roots were planted deep in gloom; save where on the borders of the sunshine broke against their stems, or swept in long streams through their avenues, washing with brighter hue all the leaves over which it flowed; revealing the rich brown of the dacayed leaves and fallen pine-cones, and the delicate greens of the long grasses and tiny forests of moss that covered the channel over which it passed in the motionless rivers of light.

Moroi shied from the sunlight but as I watched Sydney, I knew without a doubt that humans had been made for the sun.

At the sight of blackbirds Flying in a green light, Even the bawds of euphony Would cry out sharply.

The vivacity and brightness of colors in a landscape will never bear any comparison with a landscape in nature when it is illumined by the sun, unless the painting is placed in such a position that it will receive the same light from the sun as does the landscape.

The earth is mostly just a boneyard. But pretty in the sunlight.

But would you kindly ponder this question: What would your good do if evil didn't exist, and what would the earth look like if all the shadows disappeared? After all, shadows are cast by things and people. Here is the shadow of my sword. But shadows also come from trees and living beings. Do you want to strip the earth of all trees and living things just because of your fantasy of enjoying naked light? You're stupid.

[...] a darkness shining in brightness which brightness could not comprehend.