Cezanne

Published: 
A talk given in December 2008 at the Courtauld Institute in London about Cezanne's 'La Route Tournante'
Link: 
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/audioslideshow/2009/feb/23/art-art

In these later years Cezanne did not cease to study and worry, to see what he still might so. He was solitary and difficult and devoted to his art as a mystic might be to salvation. ‘I think the best thing to do is to work hard,’ he wrote. He was involved in the most exacting process which had nothing to do with either representation or with impression.

Among the Flutterers

Link: 
http://www.lrb.co.uk/v32/n16/colm-toibin/among-the-flutterers

Tóibín, C., 2010. Among the Flutterers. Review of The Pope Is Not Gay by Quattrocchi, A., translated by Giuliani, R. C. London Review of Books [Online] vol. 32 no. 16 pp. 3-9. Available from http://www.lrb.co.uk/v32/n16/colm-toibin/among-the-flutterers [Accessed 30 August 2010].

In Lovely Blueness: Adventures in Troubled Light

Published: 
In 2004 Colm Toibin curated an exhibition at the Chester Beatty Library in Dublin called 'Blue' which consisted of blue objects from the collection. This is his introduction to the catalogue.
Link: 
Chester Beatty Library Exhibition Notes

The world was a bowl of lovely soft blueness. It was early morning in Port Douglas in Queensland in Northern Australia. As the boat began to move out towards the Great Barrier Reef there was not a cloud in the sky nor a vessel in the sea. A haze of heat over the water made the sky above us seem the only solid thing on earth in its vast clarity, its implacable and untouchable beauty.