Citings & Sightings of Dante's Works in Contemporary Culture
In 2017, Toronto artist Nurgul Jones released the blackgaze album Upper and Lower Hell어퍼와 로어 지옥. Through soft, atmospheric industrial sounds, each track creates a dreamscape that might send the listener on a journey from “Circle 1: Limbo아지태” all the way to”Circle 9: The Traitorous배 교자.” A circle of Dante’s Inferno takes a titular spotlight on each one of the nine tracks.
Listen to and download the album on bandcamp here.
“Move over smiley face. Welcome to the Seventh Circle of Hell.
“Nineties grunge-rock band Nirvana, already embroiled in a long-running legal battle against fashion company Marc Jacobs over its ‘happy face’ t-shirt designs, now finds itself on the less happy end of a new copyright infringement lawsuit worthy of Dante’s trip through the underworld.
“The complaint, filed in federal court in Los Angeles [in April 2021], claims that Nirvana infringed an illustration first published in a 1949 English language translation of Dante’s Inferno. The drawing depicts Dante’s circles of Upper Hell and, like Nirvana’s smiley face logo, has been featured on the band’s merchandise for decades. [. . .]” –Aaron Moss, “Foreign Works, US Rights: The 7th Circle of Copyright Hell?” on Copyright Lately (April 30, 2021)
The disputed image was featured on the B-side of Nirvana’s debut album Bleach (Sub Pop Records, 1989).
Contributed by Jared Brust (Florida State University ’21)
