A wall sized screen with small rectangular images of daguerreotypes on it.

Ruskin’s Botanical Studies

The Ruskin and Lancaster University’s Data Immersion Suite

In collaboration with Lancaster University’s Data Immersion Suite, The Ruskin curated and hosted an immersive digital event for the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC) in June 2025, recreating Ruskin’s illustrated lecture illustrated lecture ‘On Tree Twigs’ at The Royal Institution in London in 1861, which examined ‘the connection between the laws of nature and those of art’.

The recent digitisation of the Collection has increased access for both researchers and diverse publics and opened new avenues for engagement. At the same time, viewing these works online can potentially diminish the experience, especially when it comes to appreciating the works’ original scale and detail – itself a key aspect of Ruskin’s pedagogic enterprise. To address this, The Ruskin’s collaboration with Lancaster University’s Data Immersion Suite, allowed audiences to view Ruskin’s digitised work in exquisitely high detail and resolution, but also at the work’s original scale, with some pieces being over two meters tall.

A series of artworks are projected onto the walls of a lecture room. A person sits at a desk with monitors. — Development of the exhibition, Ruskin’s lecture diagrams displayed in the Data Immersion Suite, June 2025 © The Ruskin, Lancaster University

The design and narrative of the experience was also structured to highlight multiple streams of the Ruskin’s ongoing work, such as external exhibitions and virtual and augmented reality. The result was a curated tour through Ruskin’s work that not only showcased the digitised content but also demonstrated to the audience the type of engagements that The Ruskin facilitates. As such, this use case illustrates how the Data Immersion Suite can serve not only as a high-resolution exhibition space, but as a platform for immersive, multi-dimensional engagement.