Pulcinella in Hades

Art Hazelwood

Artist, activist Art Hazelwood (born in 1961) did this color etching "Pulcinella in Hades" in 2007. Using color etching techniques Hazelwood created an accordion-folded series of plates connected mark-to-mark.

This livre d'artiste unfolds vertically to approximately 8 feet, 9 inches, and can be hung from the loop or viewed from page to page as a book. The coverboards are bound in a bronze silk cloth with steelpress embossing on the front. It was printed by the artist and David Avery at Eastside Editions in Sonoma, California.

The story is told in a series of marginalia from various translations and hand written by 17 various colleagues of the artist. These were then printed by letterpress by Jonathon Clark at Artichoke Press in Mountain View, CA. A booklet of notes on the marginalia accompanies the work.

Art Hazelwood notes: "'Pulcinella in Hades' is a decent into Hades in the form of an eight foot tall accordion book. The borders of Pulcinella in Hades contains marginalia texts by historical authors, written in longhand by 17 contributors. The text refers to the underworld from different writings. Pulcinella from the Commedia dell'Arte is here a stand in for Orpheus or Christ in a comic harrowing of hell…

"The idea of a comedy in Hades hit me when I heard an excerpt from the comic opera Orpheus in the Underworld. Why an underworld journey should be treated as a comedy can perhaps best be explained by the tremendous amount of literature to back up the view that Hell is a merry place. Comic journeys to Hell and Hades are long standing traditions. Comedy goes to Hell….

"Seventeen people were asked to write in their own hand the literary marginalia selected to accompany the text. Many complained that their handwriting is terrible. Many were correct." A booklet of notes on the marginalia accompanies the work.