Tiepolo Pink (Penguin Modern Classics)

'Tiepolo: the last breath of happiness in Europe'

Theeighteenth-century Venetian painter Giambattista Tiepolo spent his lifecreating frescoes that are among the glories of Western art, yet heremains shrouded in mystery. Who was he? And what was the significanceof the dark, bizarre etchings depicting sacrifice and magic, which hecreated alongside his heavenly works? Roberto Calasso explores Tiepoloas the last artist of the ancien régime and at the same time thefirst example of the "painter of modern life" evoked by Baudelaire. Hewas the incarnation of that peculiar Italian virtue sprezzatura: the art of not seeming artful.

Translated by Alastair McEwen

'A brilliant, eccentric, provocative . . . and thoroughly splendid celebration of a great painter' John Banville, The New Republic

'Calasso is a myth-maker ... a book that treats paintings as a kind of sorcery' Peter Conrad, Observer

Reviews

The next best thing to visiting Europe and seeing the painter's work . . . Calasso is one of the most demanding and intoxicating critics writing today.