The space of ragoûts. Diderot, the dressing gown and Penelope in a beer hall


 My article aims to interrogate the tension between space and time in Diderot’s philosophy starting from tableau of imagination its specific functioning.By examining category ragoût – a culinary preparation that, during 18th century, became an expression aesthetic relationship harmony parts whole I will show how it plays, Lettres sur les souds et muets, Essais la peinture, Salons Regrets ma vieille robe de chambre, central role defining idea dynamic spatiality, within which reality representation coexist relationships mutual correspondence.
 In fact, reveals conception convenience which, by interweaving time, recalls processes human reason interrogates them pictorial real space, making habitable comprehensible: if detail always totality, activating process orientation reality, when breaks down, world itself falls apart. It is law that regulates world: change one’s dressing gown redefine one's life entirely. If this does not happen, fragment broken, as La Grenée painting exhibited at Salon 1767, Penelope appears more suited beer hall than majestic but sober palace Ithaca.