Tiepolo Blue: 'The best novel I have read for ages' Stephen Fry

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In a series of Discourse in Art lectures spanning the decade immediately after Tiepolo's death, Sir Joshua Reynolds, the first president of the British Royal Academy, called Tiepolo the first master of what he called the Grand Manner. Reynolds's argument was that, in a return to the styles of the ancient Greeks and Romans, Grand Manner art should devote itself not so much to accuracy and fine natural detail but rather to "the grand style of invention, to composition, to expression, and even coloring drapery." Indeed, a golden thread runs from Byzantine art via Bellini, Giorgione, Titian, Tintoretto, and Veronese to Tiepolo; and from Tiepolo to Fragonard. Edit: I'm a few months wiser now and I think I understand this book better as well because of it. It's about how life is too short and unpredictable to be so anal about what and how art should be. Art, something so human and sincere, shouldn't just hold grounds on what's beautiful and not. It's about what makes us feel, think and what inspires us. This is a character-driven novel but so much happens as Don stumbles through one self-imposed crisis to another that no further plot is needed. The descriptions are excellent and the atmosphere is as dark as one expects. I was surprised that Aids wasn't mentioned, except obliquely, as it was certainly rife among gay men at that time. Also, the abruptness of the ending was a disappointment for me. What first strikes one about this fresco, which Tiepolo painted on the ceiling of the church of the Gesuati (or Sta. Maria del Rosario) in his native Venice, is its sheer size. Indeed at 40 feet by 15 feet, it is the largest version of this subject in European art.

Tiepolo Blue comes trailing clouds of glory. Clouds borne by winged putti, perhaps, to fit its subject matter; I have rarely seen a first novel by someone who is not already famous puffed so much with pre-publication quotes by people who are. This would be fine if the novel were a work of great talent but, while not actually bad, I am not sure it fulfils its promise. The plot: Professor Don Lamb is an art historian at Peterhouse, Cambridge’s oldest and weirdest college. (The name “Don” is deliberately unimaginative.) An expert on the great Italian painter Tiepolo, about whom he has been writing the definitive work for years, he has lately been outraged by a permanent exhibition of modern art on the lawn of the College’s main court (Old Court, fittingly).tiepolo blue has some of the most beautiful writing, imagery and prose that i have ever read. the plot, at times slow-paced, erred cautiously into laborious at times, but cahill's immaculately chosen word felt carefully pieced together, symbolism and meaning dripping from every letter. i'm no art historian, but i fully enjoyed the references to high culture, classical art and the inner sanctum of those working within the humanities. as the novel wore on, the ending felt forced and sudden, and i still haven't made sense of why the novel met the end it did. i enjoyed the twists, the unreliable air of distrust that permeated between don and val and don's gradual acceptance of his self and his sexuality. When an explosive piece of contemporary art is installed on the lawn of his college, it sets in motion Don’s abrupt departure from Cambridge to take up a role at a south London museum. There he befriends Ben, a young artist who draws him into the anarchic 1990s British art scene and the nightlife of Soho. I can’t remember when I first saw a Tiepolo painting, but I’ve loved those incredible vast ceiling frescoes full of swirling bodies for a long time, and the distinctive shade of blue that he uses—that mid-turquoise, a blue that seems to have a mistiness to it, like the traces of clouds. When I was young, I had an ambition or at least a desire to be an artist myself. I got as far as applying for a foundation course before I went to the Courtauld [Institute of Art]. I kept making work in a private and informal way, and one idea I had but never realised was to collage together a whole load of pieces of blue from reproductions of Tiepolo paintings to make a single variegated panel—something that happens in the book. I never did it in the end, so perhaps it was destined to be a fictional conceit rather than something that I literally created. Ben turns and grins ironically. ‘When you stopped just now and looked at the sky, you weren’t measuring it. You weren’t thinking about classical proportion. You were feeling something.’ Basically, it's a whole book of meandering plots and plot holes. No answers are ever given to the questions raised and to be honest no thought to the context of them.

I'm going to be lazy and just refer those interested to the incisive Guardian review below, but let me just end by saying this is one of the most beautifully bound volumes I've seen in recent years - not only the gorgeous gold embossed cover, but also full color endpapers of one of the titular artist's masterpieces. Highly recommended, and quite possibly my #1 book of the year.There is some debate as to when this fresco was painted, but in all likelihood, it was undertaken between 1716-19. It adorns the ceiling of the Parish Church of Biadene, near Treviso, Italy and shows the Virgin bound for Heaven borne on a cloud, flanked by a number of angels and putti. slight digression but i would have loved if they'd pressed on don/val's dynamic as former prize student/grad advisor, it would have unmuddied some of the waters behind their dynamic in the present, and also consolidated val's controlling temperament more realistically) Intense and atmospheric, Tiepolo Blue traces Don’s turbulent awakening, and his desperate flight from art into life.