Art decays over time, so why should artists put faith in posterity? This question became a major source of disagreement in the correspondence between Denis Diderot and the sculptor Étienne-Maurice Falconet. For Falconet, art’s physical instability rendered posterity meaningless. Diderot, however, refused to accept this perspective. He insisted that writers like him would save great art for future generations using vivid descriptions, delivering paintings and sculptures to posterity in words. This article argues that the disagreement between the two men stemmed from a broader historical conflict. Put simply, art and writing were developing divergent ways of travelling across time. The reproduction and dissemination of writing in the Enlightenment public sphere assured authors that their work would survive in a textual network that grew more and more indestructible in its diffuseness and redundancy. Art, however, was increasingly appreciated for material properties that resisted transmission and translation. Diderot grappled with this historical split throughout his writings on art, at times insisting on the sufficiency of language in preserving art for posterity and, at other moments, acknowledging the incommunicable materiality of visual media. His conflicted statements about artistic posterity offer an opportunity to consider what gets lost when history is reduced to the reproducible page.

中文翻译：

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狄德罗与后世的重要性

艺术随着时间的流逝而衰落，那么为什么艺术家要相信后代呢？这个问题成为丹尼斯·狄德罗（Denis Diderot）与雕塑家埃蒂安·莫里斯·法尔科涅特（Étienne-MauriceFalconet）之间书信的不同之处。对于Falconet而言，艺术的物理不稳定使后代变得毫无意义。但是，狄德罗拒绝接受这种观点。他坚持认为，像他这样的作家将通过生动的描写为后代保存伟大的艺术作品，用文字传达绘画和雕塑给后代。本文认为，两人之间的分歧源于更广泛的历史冲突。简而言之，艺术和写作正在发展跨时的不同旅行方式。在启蒙运动公共领域中复制和传播写作向作者保证，他们的作品将在一个文本网络中生存，该文本网络的扩散性和冗余性变得越来越坚不可摧。然而，对于抵抗传输和平移的材料特性，艺术越来越受到赞赏。狄德罗（Diderot）在他所有的艺术作品中都致力于解决这一历史分歧，有时坚持语言的充分性来保存后代艺术，在其他时候则承认视觉媒体具有不可沟通的实质性。他关于艺术后代的矛盾说法提供了一个机会，可以考虑将历史缩小到可复制的页面时所丢失的内容。抵抗传输和平移的材料特性受到越来越多的赞赏。狄德罗（Diderot）在他所有的艺术作品中都致力于解决这一历史分歧，有时坚持语言的充分性来保存后代艺术，在其他时候则承认视觉媒体具有不可沟通的实质性。他关于艺术后代的矛盾说法提供了一个机会，可以考虑将历史缩小到可复制的页面时所丢失的内容。抵抗传输和平移的材料特性受到越来越多的赞赏。狄德罗（Diderot）在他所有的艺术作品中都致力于解决这一历史分歧，有时坚持语言的充分性来保存后代艺术，在其他时候则承认视觉媒体具有不可沟通的实质性。他关于艺术后代的矛盾说法提供了一个机会，可以考虑将历史缩小到可复制的页面时所丢失的内容。