The Typographic Dante

34 Cantos of The Inferno (Hell) are realised using the wood and metal type of letterpress printing. 33 Cantos of Purgatory are created on a typewriter, and 33 Cantos of Paradise are visualised with Letraset. The following pages, selected from the work, accompany Dante’s poem. 

Medieval manuscripts connected typography and image in the form of illuminated characters. The Typographic Dante seeks to return to the interconnectedness of the word and the image using 'dead' technologies that are liberated from their commercial restrictions.

And when we stood by Geryon’s side, I noticed,
     a little further on, some people crouched
     in the sand quite close to the edge of emptiness.

Nothing; only great bubbles black as ink
     Would rise and burst there; or the seething tide
     Heave up all over, and settle again and sink

and then, these ashes scattered on the ground
     began to come together on their own
     and quickly take the form they had before:

The Loser at the hazard, when the game breaks up,
     Sadder and sorrier lingers on alone,
     Re-plays each throw, and drinks of wisdom’s cup.

When, all at once, and close behind our backs
     Startling me up, a throng came roundabout,
    Wheeling towards us in their circling tracks.

The water here does not spring from a source
     that needs to be restored by changing mists,
     like streams on earth that lose, then gain, their force:

From those holiest waters I returned
     to her reborn, a tree renewed, in bloom
     with newborn foliage, immaculate.

So I saw lights revolving in that light,
     their movements slow or swift, each I suppose,
     according to how clearly it sees God.

The instant I stopped speaking all of Heaven
     filled with sweet singing, as my lady joined
     the others chanting: ‘Holy! Holy! Holy’

who is that angel who so joyously
     looks straight into the eyes of Heaven’s Queen,
     so much in love he seems to burn like fire?