Ebenezer Cooke (1837 - 1913) was an art master and pioneer in

art education Visual arts education is the area of learning that is based upon the kind of art that one can see, visual arts—drawing, painting, sculpture, printmaking, and design in jewelry, pottery, weaving, fabrics, etc. and design applied to more practic ...

. An apprenticed

lithographic Lithography () is a planographic method of printing originally based on the immiscibility of oil and water. The printing is from a stone (lithographic limestone) or a metal plate with a smooth surface. It was invented in 1796 by the German a ...

draughtsman A draughtsman (British spelling) or draftsman (American spelling) may refer to: * An architectural drafter, who produced architectural drawings until the late 20th century * An artist who produces drawings that rival or surpass their other types ...

, he was introduced by his brother

Mordecai Mordecai (; also Mordechai; , IPA: ) is one of the main personalities in the Book of Esther in the Hebrew Bible. He is described as being the son of Jair, of the tribe of Benjamin. He was promoted to Vizier after Haman was killed. Biblical acco ...

to the lectures of

Frederick Denison Maurice John Frederick Denison Maurice (29 August 1805 – 1 April 1872), known as F. D. Maurice, was an English Anglican theologian, a prolific author, and one of the founders of Christian socialism. Since World War II, interest in Maurice has exp ...

at the Hall of Association, 34 Castle Street East, London, in 1853 and the summer of 1854. When the Working Men's College was formed in 1854, he attended

John Ruskin John Ruskin (8 February 1819 20 January 1900) was an English writer, philosopher, art critic and polymath of the Victorian era. He wrote on subjects as varied as geology, architecture, myth, ornithology, literature, education, botany and politi ...

’s first drawing classes. After an unsuccessful partnership with John Fotheringham, also a student at the college, he gave up his trade and then took to teaching through the influence of Ruskin. He succeeded Ruskin as a drawing master at the college, and taught at other London establishments. During the 1850s and 1860s Cooke was influenced by

Herbert Spencer Herbert Spencer (27 April 1820 – 8 December 1903) was an English philosopher, psychologist, biologist, anthropologist, and sociologist famous for his hypothesis of social Darwinism. Spencer originated the expression "survival of the fittest" ...

, and became a student of

Pestalozzi Pestalozzi is the surname of an Italian family originally based in Gravedona and Chiavenna who settled in Switzerland during the Counter-Reformation. Members of this family include: * Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi (1746–1827), Swiss pedagogue an ...

, developing an enthusiasm for the Pestalozzian and Froebellian methods in which he became an influential interpreter. With Thomas Ablett, Alexander Bain, and psychologist

James Sully James Sully (3 March 1842 – 1 November 1923) was an English psychologist. Biography James Sully was born at Bridgwater, Somerset, the son of J. W. Sully, a liberal Baptist merchant and ship-owner. He was educated at the Independent Colle ...

, he furthered art education thinking; Sully and Cooke were a particular influence on each other. He served on the Council of the Education Society (founded 1875) which later became the Society for the Development of the Science of Education. In 1885 Cooke published an analysis of children's drawings that became a great influence on teachers and researchers, and in 1894 published an English edition of Pestalozzi's ''How Gertrude Teaches Her Children''. In 1904 he sat on the Committee of the Third International Congress for the Development of Drawing and Art Teaching.

Vanessa Bell Vanessa Bell (née Stephen; 30 May 1879 – 7 April 1961) was an English painter and interior designer, a member of the Bloomsbury Group and the sister of Virginia Woolf (née Stephen). Early life and education Vanessa Stephen was the eld ...

began her art education under the tutelage of Cooke. Cooke was a younger brother of the botanist and mycologist

Mordecai Cubitt Cooke Mordecai Cubitt Cooke (12 July 1825, in Horning, Norfolk – 12 November 1914, in Southsea, Hampshire) was an English botanist and mycologist who was, at various points, a London schoolteacher, a Kew mycologist, curator at the India Museum, jour ...

(1825 - 1914) and helped illustrate a number of his publications.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Cooke, Ebenezer English philosophers 1853 births 1904 deaths British reformers 19th-century English educators 19th-century British philosophers