georges didi huberman, confronti... - lensbased.net

62 Confronting Imagesagain into the same chaos of ruin; that these my labors,whatsoever they may be worth (if indeed they may be worthyof a happier fortune), both through what has been alreadysaid and through what remains to say, may be able tokeep her alive. 21Such, then, was the first disegno, the first grand design* of Vasarithe historian: to save artists from their supposed ‘‘second death,’’ torender art unforgettable. In other words: immortal. Immortal throughits ever-recurrent names, eternal through its transmitted ‘‘reputation,’’its fama. The intention, yet again, is revealed in the book’s framingelements. First on the very title page of the first edition (Fig. 2), whosecaryatids both assumed an allegorical function: the one on the right,with his lyre and laurel crown—traditional attributes of Apollo—lookstoward a female figure whose interpretation now seems more problematic;she holds up a torch, and a spherical object lies at her feet.Study of other allegorical series by Vasari, notably his paintings in theSalone dei 100 in the Pallazzo della Cancelleria in Rome, reveals thatwhat’s in question is precisely a personification of Eternità. 22We find her again, both more dazzling and more ambiguous, inthe print on the final page of the Torrentino edition (Fig. 3). She ismore dazzling because she occupies the whole upper register of theimage, and because her torch—as well as she herself—illuminates itsmiddle space with beams of light that radiate like a glory. Her ambiguity,let’s say rather her composite character, is no less interestingand deliberate. First, because the figure is vaguely androgynous andevokes the angel of the Resurrection, with his trumpet waking thedead; but also because it represents (feminine) Renown, fama soundingits own trumpet glorifying the three Arts of Design: Sculpture,Architecture, and Painting, figured in the middle space as the ThreeFates presiding over the destiny of artists who died for them—poorartists whose bodies are jumbled together in the nether regions ofoblivion. So we see that this vignette should be read in the ascendant,and that it is an allegory of historical operation itself, when it saves*dessein.