Citings & Sightings of Dante's Works in Contemporary Culture
“Spend enough time in the tech industry, and you’ll eventually find yourself in IT hell — one not unlike the underworld described by Dante in his Divine Comedy.
“But here, in the data centers, conference rooms, and cubicles, the IT version of this inferno is no allegory. It is a very real test of every IT pro’s sanity and soul.” –Dan Tynan, Info World, 2011
Read the full article here.
@kmustatea on Instagram (January 30, 2021)
“Voidopolis is a digital performance about loss and memory that is currently unfolding over 45 posts on my Instagram feed (@kmustatea). Started July 1, 2020, it is a loose retelling of Dante’s Inferno, informed by the grim experience of wandering through NYC during a pandemic. Instead of the poet Virgil, my guide is a caustic hobo named Nikita.” –Kat Mustatea
Featuring a Dantesque cast of characters ranging from the Virgilian Nikita to a mohawked Minos, a gruff ferryman named Kim and a withdrawn George Perec, Mustatea’s Voidopolis weaves through the pandemic-deserted streets of Manhattan, a posthuman landscape of absence and loss, bearing witness to its vanishings. Voidopolis won the 2020 Arts & Letters “Unclassifiable” Prize for Literature, and received a Literature grant from the Cafe Royal Cultural Foundation.
To read more about both the process of the piece and its influences, including Dante, see the interview with Mustatea featured in Dovetail Magazine (2020).
“After Beyond the Castle’s success, we embarked in a new project that celebrates Italian culture. Together with the most prestigious school of Milan, the Collegio San Carlo, we created a new virtual reality experience that focuses on Dante’s Divine Comedy. In The Hell’s Gate students can embody Dante and walk through the dark forest. This will allow them to approach this masterpiece in an innovative and engaging way.” —Beyond the Gate, 2019
“This was the large shed to the south of the water and my position is a best guess, especially as this area is now flat. This shed contained several hammers but these two were hard at work and quite spectacular. I think they were of eastern European construction (possibly Polish). Although working on compressed air these were essentially the same as steam hammers.” –Chris Allen, Geograph, February 17, 2010
“‘No, that’s definitely the way you want to go,’ said the same man in the hi-vis jacket, whose integrity we were beginning to doubt. But every route we tried, the satnav eventually led us back to the same roundabout, often by the most circuitous of routes. We had no mobile coverage, so could not raise a map by those means. It was like an episode of The Prisoner. Every wrong turning we took, we expected a huge white barrage balloon to head us off.” –Marcus Berkmann, The Independent, October 9, 2015
“While Australia-based Audinate’s Dante is one of several competing protocols for communicating multiple audio channels over standard Ethernet and IP networks, it has led the industry in media attention, awards and licensing agreements with an impressive list of partners. With applications in live sound, recording and conferencing, Shure jumped on board in 2012 and joined the ranks of Allen & Heath, Yamaha, and many, many others. Dante represented an opportunity to bring a high performance plug-and-play experience to users of Shure’s ULX-D digital wireless system, SCM820 Automatic Mixer and Microflex Wireless.
“In this post, we’ll address a few of the basics, so that the next time Dante comes up in conversation, you won’t be thinking of the Middle Ages poet who wrote the Divine Comedy [. . .].” –Gino Sigismondi (Senior Manager, Shure Systems Support), “What You Need To Know About Dante,” shure.com
Contributed by Pete Maiers
“Inferno is a commentary system for a single user, or for a large multi commentator system. Connections use network audio cabling, either directly to the GSI-DARK88 break out box, or across a structured network. The Dante audio protocol is used to transport the audio, making the system flexible and programmable as part of a larger Dante system.” –“Inferno” info sheet, Glensound
Glensound is a UK-based manufacturer specializing in audio hardware for live sound, studio, and broadcast. Besides Inferno, their products include units called Beatrice, Virgil, Styx, and Divine, all of which integrate with Dante-based systems.
DANTE is a digital media networking technology produced by Audinate. The acronym stands for Digital Audio Network Through Ethernet.
Contributed by Pete Maiers
“The annual Innovation In Music conference in London recently saw Audinate’s Dante help deliver a first of its kind performance, according to audio engineer Dr Paul Ferguson.
“The conference is an international music event that brings together researchers and professionals shaping the future of the music industry. The event welcomes academics, artists, producers, engineers, music industry professionals, and manufacturers to come together and hear presentations and discussions on a wide range of topics. The most recent conference was held at the University of West London’s Ealing Campus and covered a number of topics including music production, performance and composition, studio technology innovation, and platforms for music sale, streaming and broadcast, to name a few.
[. . .]
“‘Unfortunately, the COVID-19 virus has brought a new perspective to performing, and for gigging musicians, this GPS clock capability potentially allows musicians to safely connect and collaborate over hundreds of miles,’ added Ferguson. ‘What happens when artists want to do their next album or collaborate with others? Until our work lives return to normal, this presents an excellent, next-best-thing-to-being-there option. And even after the ban is lifted, this will be an economical and efficient way to bring creativity together over great distances.'” –Daniel Gumble, Installation, June 9, 2020
In this case, the reference is to DANTE, the AV networking protocol (Digital Audio Network Through Ethernet). The acronym and the image of the circles (as well as some of the marketing around Audinate’s Dante and related products) play on the name and fame of the poet.
“The new TM-Dante and TM-Ravenna units are now available with ST 2110 functionality, and existing owners can add this option via a free firmware update.” —The Broadcast Bridge, May 7, 2020
