The Cult of Ruins

Ruins played a major role in influencing the 18th -century architectural taste for buildings and
private and public parks. The idea that ruins could be used to create a pleasing effect was
fostered by the tradition of picturesque landscape painting.

1.In this classical Landscape by Louis-Gabriel Moreau (1740-1806) ruins are pleasing more for
their power of suggestion than for their intrinsic architectural value. They are overgrown with
plants, almost part of the surrounding nature. The sensibility behind this picture is akin to that
of Sterne’s Sentimental Journey .

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2.This design for a ruin to be built at Mistley Hall, was drawn by Robert Adam in 1761. Adam
had studied in Rome and made a survey of famous antiquities such as Diocletian’s palace at
Split, in Dalmatia. His majestic arches and vaults – which recall the ruins of the Roman Forum
in Rome – are also overgrown with vegetation and here too human figures move unobtrusively
in a world where art and nature rule undisturbed. On the right, two women are busy around
what seems to be either a well or an urn; on the left, a man is reading, sitting on a stone.
Such fake ruins were very popular in English gardens, giving an appearance more typical of an
Italian landscape.

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