Of Ruskin's personal appearance, many varying accounts have been given. He is often spoken of as short in stature, but this is not correct. “I grant, alas!” wrote Mrs. Arthur Severn in 1891, “that in the last ten years he has stooped so much that he has shrunk into what might be considered by some people a little man; but about twenty-five years ago, I should certainly have called him much above the average height. And as a young man he was well over 5 feet 10 inches—indeed, almost 5 feet 11 inches; and people who knew him then would have called him tall.” Richmond's portrait of 1842 (No. 6) is of a tall, slight young man; the stoop and hunched appearance of the back, in old age, are suggested in Barraud's photograph (No. 47).

Unfortunately Ruskin was not among the eminent men of the time painted by Watts. “It would have been impossible for me to attempt it,” he said, for “I should have felt paralysed in Ruskin's presence.” In 1859 and later Ruskin gave sittings to Rossetti (XXXVI. 311, 329, 335, 405, 497), but nothing came of them except a very unsatisfactory crayon drawing (No. 15). In 1866 Ruskin gave sittings to Burne-Jones, who made some drawings, but these were not preserved (see XXXVI. 500, 501, 504, 511, 521, 522).