JOHN WHARLTON BUNNEY (1828-1882)

Bunney studied drawing under Ruskin at the Working Men's College, before becoming a clerk for Smith, Elder & Co., Ruskin's publisher. By 1859 he had given up his clerical job, and Ruskin had commissioned him to produce a series of drawings in Italy and Switzerland. When he married in 1863, he settled in Florence, and Bunney worked for Ruskin's St George's Company, recording the architecture of northern Italy, for the rest of his life.
The present drawing shows Florence from a point to the south-east, probably the hill of San Miniato. The bridge in the foreground is the 13th Century Ponte alle Grazie, destroyed in World War II.