Joan Winterkorn to give Ruskin annual Mikimoto Lecture

4 October 2022

Joan Winterkorn, world expert on archives and literary and historical manuscripts, will give the 2022 Mikimoto Lecture at The Royal Society, ‘Valuing John Ruskin’. The 2022 Ruskin annual Mikimoto Lecture will be held at the Royal Society on 4 October 2022, in the evening. It will be hosted by our Vice-Chancellor, Professor Andy Schofield. The Mikimoto Memorial Lecture is supported by a generous donation from the Trustees of the Ruskin Library of Tokyo.

John Ruskin’s relevance to the modern world has never been more important. When, in 2019, with the help of the National Heritage Memorial Fund and other very generous donors, Lancaster University purchased the Ruskin Whitehouse Collection, we did so in order to keep the largest collection of Ruskin’s works together in trust for the nation. Our lecture, ‘Valuing John Ruskin’, will reflect on his significance to the 21st Century, and will be delivered by Joan Winterkorn, influential expert in literary and historical manuscripts and member of the Ruskin Advisory Board. Joan was responsible for valuing The Ruskin Whitehouse Collection on behalf of the National Memorial Heritage Fund for the purchase of the Collection by Lancaster University in 2018. Joan is well placed to share personal insights on this immense resource. She writes, ‘I love the business of valuing archives, and letting them tell me their story. I never know what I might find, and in every archive there is something unexpected and revealing.’

In the Mikimoto Lecture Joan will describe her encounters with Ruskin elsewhere (outside of The Ruskin Whitehouse Collection), in unexpected archives and collections across the UK and USA, with particular reference to Ruskin as a book collector.

The event is free to attend. Registration is required.