Forgotten Victorian Sheffield artist Benjamin Creswick was John Ruskin's working-class hero

Leeds City Art Gallery Tea Room - medallions by Sheffield artist Benjamin Creswick

In 1875 John Ruskin, one of the most influential writers and thinkers on art and society of his day, launched a bold experiment in a largely working-class neighbourhood in the west of Sheffield.

The neighbourhood was Walkley, then known as ‘the working man’s garden suburb’ due to its roots in the Freehold Land Society movement.

The experiment was St George’s Museum , which Ruskin set up at his own expense, stocked with carefully-selected paintings, sculptures and specimens which he hoped would inspire the working people of Sheffield, whose skills and traditions he much admired, to enjoy and make things of beauty and integrity.

To the delight of Ruskin and the curator of the museum, Henry Swan, it worked almost immediately as a 22-year-old table knife grinder named Benjamin Creswick, who lived just a couple of streets away, walked into the museum and was found to have a natural talent for art, initially modelling a bust of Ruskin in clay which was much admired by the great man.

Birth of the Arts and Crafts Movement - the first edition of the Century Guild's Magazine Hobby Horse 1884

Ruskin recognised his talent and eventually offered him and his family enough support to quit the highly unhealthy and dangerous grinding job and become a full-time artist.

Creswick and his family even moved over to the Lake District to be close to Ruskin at his Brantwood retreat and Ruskin also introduced his protégé to some of his wealthy friends who began to commission work from him.

Less than 10 years later Creswick was working and living in London as an important member of the seminal Century Guild and taking part in the birth of the Arts and Crafts Movement.