"Before and after the gothic style": lo sguardo di Ruskin all'architettura, dai templi di Paestum al tardo Rinascimento

If Ruskin's publications clearly sanction the superiority of architecture gothic for its ethical values, its high religiousness and the collective work that have always characterized it, much more confused is the historiographical conception of the English architect who, since his journey to Italy in 1840-1841, described Paestum as " one of the most complete disappointments I have yet experienced” and found Florence an insignificant city. The scientific speculation, the search for technical perfection and the absence of a certain "decadentism" are probably at the origin of the Ruskinian disappointment towards Renaissance art. The paper proposes, through an analysis of Ruskin's publications, to reflect on the historical interpretation as well as on the chronological layout and the stylistic evaluation underlying the Ruskinian thought