Japan Pavilion Exhibition in Tokyo
—From the 59th International Art Exhibition, La Biennale di Venezia
DUMB TYPE｜2022: remap

Sakamoto Ryuichi, a project member of this exhibition, passed away on March 28.
We wish to express once again our gratitude for the sounds he was engaged in,
the sounds that fill this exhibition space.
Rest in peace, Sakamoto Ryuichi.

— Artizon Museum, Ishibashi Foundation

We are deeply shocked and saddened by the passing of Sakamoto Ryuichi.
It was a great honor for us to work with him.
Thank you Ryuichi for everything you gave us.
His spirit and music will live with us forever. May he rest in peace.

April 2, 2023
— Dumb Type

As one of the greatest artists of Japan,
Sakamoto Ryuichi connected people all over the world through his activities.
We wish to express our deepest respect. May he rest in peace.

— The Japan Foundation


Dumb Type, a progressive Japanese art collective, was selected to exhibit in the Japan Pavilion at the 59th International Art Exhibition (organized by The Japan Foundation). Since its formation in 1984, Dumb Type has woven the relationship between the body and technology, using unique methods, into its performance works and installations. Having newly welcomed Sakamoto Ryuichi into the group, Dumb Type presented a new work, 2022, at the Venice Biennale. This work, which spurs thought about communication methods and ways to perceive the world in the “post-truth” age, will be recomposed at the Artizon Museum. The Ishibashi Foundation has provided support for exhibitions in the Japan Pavilion at the Venice Biennale in recent years. Ishibashi Shojiro, the foundation’s founder, personally donated the funding to build of the Japan Pavilion in 1956, and the Ishibashi Foundation made a proposal for the renovation of the Japan Pavilion in 2014 and donated the construction costs. Given those historic connections, with the opening of the Artizon Museum, Ishibashi Foundation, in 2020, the museum started to introduce the exhibitions in the Japan Pavilion at the International Art Exhibition at La Biennale di Venezia more widely in Japan.

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Japan Pavilion Exhibition in Tokyo
—From the 59th International Art Exhibition, La Biennale di Venezia
Dumb Type, 2022: remap

Exhibition
Overview

Exhibition title:
Japan Pavilion Exhibition in Tokyo
—From the 59th International Art Exhibition,
La Biennale di Venezia Dumb Type, 2022:remap
Organized by:
Venue:  Artizon Museum, 6F Gallery
Exhibition period: February 25 [Sat] – May 14 [Sun], 2023
Photo: Shiro Takatani ¦ Courtesy of The Japan Foundation
Photo: Kazuo Fukunaga

Exhibition Highlights

1

Recomposing 2022 and exhibiting it as 2022: remap for the first time in Japan

2022 is a new installation work that was presented in the Japan Pavilion at the 59th International Art Exhibition at La Biennale di Venezia. Rather than merely exhibiting it a second time in Tokyo, Dumb Type has remapped as 2022: remap for the space in the 6F gallery of the Artizon Museum. For La Biennale di Venezia, with its array of national pavilions, 2022 was created to question the nature of communication in today’s world, with its political boundaries and the internet, an infrastructure transcending national borders, its spatial basis. That work is now recomposed—remapped—specifically for this site.

2

New Work—Welcoming Sakamoto Ryuichi

Sakamoto Ryuichi had been creating many works with Takatani Shiro since about 2007 on. Now, for the first time, he has been involved in creating work as a member of Dumb Type. Sakamoto created a new soundtrack for this work. He also elicited field recordings from locations throughout the world. Those sounds, through Dumb Type’s visual language, signify making each person on the site listen and highlight the nature of knowledge acquired via machines. Texts from an 1850s geography textbook, posing simple yet universal questions, are projected on the walls using unique laser devices. The voices of Sakamoto’s friends (including David Sylvian and Kahimi Karie) reading aloud surrounds the area and are expressed above a boundary visible, or perhaps not, audible, or perhaps not.

3

The Dumb Type Experience Thus Far, Compressed

Since the mid 1980s, Dumb Type has acutely questioned, through advanced combinations of images, sounds, mechanical devices, and spaces, the relationship between the human body and technology, which has been updated at amazing speed. Their installation works interlock with their performance works. That is true of 2022 as well: it is connected to 2022, their first new performance work in 18 years. 2022: remap, introduced by this exhibition, employs a new mixture of the turntables the collective used in a past work, Playback, and the expressive language of TRACE/REACT II. In it, earlier visual and sound modes of expression are combined and renewed, providing a vivid sense of Dumb Type’s creativity and concerns.

What is Geography?
What is the Earth?
What is the shape of the Earth?
Of what is the Earth composed?
What is a Continent?
How many Continents are there?
On which Continent do we live?
What is an Ocean?
How many Oceans are there?
Which is the largest Ocean?
What is an Island?
What is a Mountain?
What is a Hill?
What is a Volcano?
What is a Desert?
By what are Deserts formed?
What is a River?
By what are Rivers formed?
Who governs an Empire?
Who governs a Kingdom?
Who governs a Republic?
Which is the largest Empire in the world?
Which is the largest Kingdom in the world?
Which is the largest Republic in the world?
In what Division of the Earth do we live?
When you look at the rising Sun, what Ocean is before you?
Where does the Sun rise?
Where, then, is the Atlantic Ocean?
When you look at the setting Sun, what Ocean is before you?
Where does the Sun set?
What Ocean east of Asia?
What Ocean south of Asia?
What Ocean west of Africa?
What Sea south of Europe?
Which is the largest Island in the World?
How many Countries are there?
How are they divided?
What Country furthest north?
What Country furthest south?
In what Country do we live?
Where is Cape Farewell?

Excerpt from First Lessons In Geography,
by James Monteith 1856

Photo: Shiro Takatani

Artists’ Profile

Dumb Type

Founded in 1984, Dumb Type is comprised of artists from diverse backgrounds―visual art, music, video, dance, design, programming and other fields―all contributing to a great variety of stage and installation productions over the years. They have maintained an open-ended creative style with no fixed director and a changing roster of members participating in each new production as part of their on-going exploration of ever new possibilities in artistic collaboration. Since its formation, Dumb Type has worked toward a broadening of the possibilities for artistic expression.
Their works have been presented in numerous festivals and exhibitions, including the Guggenheim Museum Soho, New York (1994), Hong Kong Arts Festival (1996), Barbican Centre, London (1998), Walker Art Center, Minneapolis (1999), Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago(1999), New National Theatre, Tokyo (2000), Singapore Arts Festival (2002), Venice Biennale (2003), Seoul International Modern Dance Festival (2005), Melbourne International Arts Festival (2006), Martin-Gropius-Bau, Berlin (2007), The Athens Concert Hall (2009), Romaeuropa, Palazzo delle Esposizioni (2017), solo exhibition at Centre Pompidou-Metz, France (2018), Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo (2019‒20) and Haus der Kunst Munich (2022), among others.

Photo: Shiro Takatani

Project Members
TAKATANI Shiro, SAKAMOTO Ryuichi, FURUDATE Ken, HAMA Satoshi, SHIRAKI Ryo, MINAMI Takuya, HARA Marihiko, TOMARI Hiromasa, SORA Norika, TAKATANI Yoko

Voices: David Sylvian, TAKEUCHI Maria, Kahimi Karie, Niki

Field Recordings (originally recorded for the installation Playback directed by Sakamoto Ryuichi for the Dumb Type Exhibition at Haus der Kunst in 2022):

YAN Jun (Beijing)
Crosby BOLANI (Cape Town)
Apichatpong WEERASETHAKUL (Chiang Mai)
Kali MALONE & Stephen O’MALLEY (La Tour-de-Peilz)
Mukul PATEL (London)
John WARWICKER (Melbourne)
Martin HERNANDEZ (Mexico City)
Giuseppe LA SPADA (Mount Etna)
Damian LENTINI (Munich)
Alec FELLMAN (New York)
Andri Snær MAGNASON & Kaśka PALUCH (Reykjavik)
Jaques MORELENBAUM (Rio de Janeiro)
Atom Heart (Santiago)
CHENG Chou (Taipei)
Nima MASSALI (Tehran)
ONO Seigen (Tokyo)