Diderot on Art, Volume I: The Salon of 1765 and Notes on Painting

denis diderot john goodman thomas crow

The eighteenth-century French philosophe Denis Diderot?the principal intelligence behind the Encyclopédie and the author of idiosyncratic fictional works such as Jacques the Fatalist and Rameau’s Nephew ?was also the first great art critic. Until now, however, Diderot’s treatises on the visual arts have been available only in French. This two-volume edition makes the most important of his art-critical texts available in English for the first time. Diderot’s works are among the most provocative and engaging products of the French Enlightenment. Moreover, their ruminations on many issues of perennial interest (invention versus convention, nature versus culture, and technique versus imagination; the complex relations between economic reality and artistic achievement) give them a rare pertinence to current debates on the nature and function of representation. All the celebrated pieces are the rhapsodic dream meditation inspired by Fragonards’ Corésus and Callierhoé ; the incident-packed ?excursion” through a set of landscapes by Joseph Vernet; the evocative consideration of the nature of ruins and historical nostalgia prompted by the first showing of works by Hubert Robert. But these famous passages can now be considered in their proper context, surrounded by meditations that are less well known but equally sparkling. The book also includes brief introductory texts and annotations by John Goodman that clarify the many references to contemporary Parisian culture, as well as an introduction by Thomas Crow that sets the texts in their historical and art-historical context.

Genres philosophyartclassics

312 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1,1995

This edition

Format: 312 pages, Hardcover
Published: January 1, 1995 by Yale University Press
ISBN: 9780300062489
ASIN: 0300062486
Language: English

About the author

denis diderot

Work on the Encyclopédie (1751-1772), supreme accomplishment of French philosopher and writer Denis Diderot, epitomized the spirit of thought of Enlightenment; he also wrote novels, plays, critical essays, and brilliant letters to a wide circle of friends and colleagues.

Jean le Rond d'Alembert contributed.

This artistic prominent persona served as best known co-founder, chief editor, and contributor.

He also contributed notably to literature with Jacques le fataliste et son maître (Jacques the Fatalist and his Master), which emulated Laurence Sterne in challenging conventions regarding structure and content, while also examining ideas about free will. Diderot also authored of the known dialogue, Le Neveu de Rameau (Rameau's Nephew), basis of many articles and sermons about consumer desire. His articles included many topics.

Diderot speculated on free will, held a completely materialistic view of the universe, and suggested that heredity determines all human behavior. He therefore warned his fellows against an overemphasis on mathematics and against the blind optimism that sees in the growth of physical knowledge an automatic social and human progress. He rejected the idea of progress. His opinion doomed the aim of progressing through technology to fail. He founded on experiment and the study of probabilities. He wrote several articles and supplements concerning gambling, mortality rates, and inoculation against smallpox. He discreetly but firmly refuted technical errors and personal positions of d'Alembert on probability.