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Noise and Nudity: Kyoto’s
dumb type
By
Cynthia Gendrich and Woodrow Hood
As academia continues to embrace
multi cultural and non‑Western theatrical practice, it becomes imperative
that we not only examine historical forms and practices but also their current
manifestations. When you mention Japanese theatre to most Americans, visions
bloom of heavily costumed and painted performers dancing down thrust stages.
Unfortunately, we historians help promote these images by generalizing all
Japanese theatre into three types: Kabuki, Noh, and Bunraku. However, this
ignores the breadth of Japanese theatrical production today. Such an approach
is a bit like using Shakespeare to discuss all theatrical production in the
West.
One of the most startling new
trends in contemporary Japanese performance is what may be called “noise art”
or “Japanoize,” a genre often classified as performance art in the West, and
most often discussed in experimental music circles. However, many of these
noise artists have created gallery installations and performance art. Multi‑media,
postmodern productions in Japan
have embraced new forms and new concepts that are quite different from Chris
Burden’s self‑mutilations and Vito Acconci’s voyeuristic work in the
1970s, and even from the 1980s boom of Laurie Anderson, Spalding Gray, and
Karen Finley.
One of the finest examples of the
innovative activity currently in the Japanese experimental performance scene
comes from a group from Kyoto
known as dumb type (always seen in lower case letters). One of the most
striking differences in dumb type’s performance work is a shift away from the
solo performance artist. In place of the master creator comes a collective of
performers and artists working on a complex series of problems and issues. dumb
type makes performance art that does not rely on the personality or charisma of
a solo performer.
Performance artists of the 1980s
saw the potential in utilizing both live performance and recorded media to hit
an audience; Spalding Gray’s films and Laurie Anderson’s albums and Puppet Motel
cd‑rom are but a
few examples. New performing artists, including dumb type, have expanded this
trend, developing installations, cd‑roms, www broadcasts, compact discs,
and videos, as well as performances. The transportation of the original concept
shifts through each manifestation. The first performance never resembles the
final one. Not only does the artwork become a communication of a central idea
or concept but it also documents the effects of multiple media upon the artwork
itself.
Aesthetically, we may draw a
useful comparison between dumb type and the installation pieces of American
artists Bruce Naumann and Bill Viola. As in Naumann and Viola’s work, dumb type
explores light and sound technology, as well as the balance between the
interaction of light, sound, space, and performer(s). As an art collective,
dumb type freely moves from underground art galleries to uptown museums, as
well as traditional theatrical venues, adopting and changing personnel as they
go. dumb type also compares well with Butoh dance, a performing art developed
in Post‑WWII Japan with roots in martial arts, among other things. The
strong presence of the performer, and the fully energized, flexible bodies of
the “dancers” in Butoh are strikingly similar to the performers in the dumb
type collective.
dumb type was formed in the early
1980s by a group of students at Kyoto
University of the
Arts. Its members include musicians,
dancers, graphic designers, computer scientists, and architects. It was
originally held together by performer and artistic director, Teiji Furuhashi.
Though not the primary source for all artistic work, Furuhashi acted as a
through line between dumb type’s phases.
Self‑described as a
political theatre, dumb type is well known for examining human existence
through the oppressive and dehumanizing lens of technology. Admitting to
influences by the Butai as well as other experimental Japanese art groups from
the 1950s, and some familiarity with the work of Michel Foucault, dumb type’s
work consists of not only live performance but also art installations, compact
discs, video performance, sculpture, and photography. Often performances are
translated into gallery installations and then back again. Many of dumb type’s
art works have even moved into the permanent collections of well‑known
museums in New York, France,
and Japan.
One remarkable piece, Lovers, is part
of the Museum of Modern
Art’s permanent collection in New York. The video/audio installation
superimposes nude male and female bodies with a ghostlike image of Furuhashi
himself.
For their live performances, dumb
type will often take months preparing the new piece, sometimes going so far as
to completely remodel and restructure the performance space to suit the needs
of the troupe. For example, The Order of
the Square, dumb type’s first major performance, took place over a full
year. Ticket holders received an announcement with directions that took them to
a site‑specific venue where they would voyeuristically peep through a
hole to see the performance. A variety of venues were used, including a
department store, an art gallery, and the garden of a temple. Some performances
even took place on the street. But their work really took off in 1988 with Pleasure Life, which appeared at PS122
in New York and the ICA
(Institute of Contemporary
Art) in London, as well as
throughout Europe and Japan.
For this work the audience was positioned above and around the playing space,
which consisted of a combination of projections and live performers. The next
year saw video installations in San Francisco, Boston, Seattle, New York, Cincinnati, and Houston.
However, it was their work of the
early 1990s that reshaped how dumb type approached performance. Working under
the auspices of the Wacoal Arts Center
in Tokyo, they
began experimentation with the effects of sound upon the human body. The Spiral Building
(home to Wacoal Arts) became the collective’s testing ground as they built
installations and sound pieces within the structure of the building. This lead
to their performance piece pH in 1990‑92
at Spiral Hall, Tokyo.
pH, which stands for post‑history,
imagines the possible future effects of technology on human life.
Similar to Pleasure Life, the audience for pH
was seated above the performance space, but this time in a modified tennis
court arrangement. The space consisted of a sixteen‑meter white linoleum
floor, over which a pair of large computer‑controlled trusses moved back
and forth. The trusses flooded the floor with light and projections, while the
performers danced, sang, and moved in relation to these large moving
structures, seeming like creatures caught in a giant flat‑bed scanner.
In 1992, dumb type followed this success
with their performance of S/N. Based
on the concept of the ratio of signal to noise, S/N exposed issues rarely seen together in Japanese
performance—AIDS, homosexuality, gender, identity, life, death, and
nationality. Here, dumb type queried the difference between pure signal
(truth/reality) as opposed to noise (learned/cultural), especially in relation
to notions of sex and identity. S/N
toured Japan and Europe extensively and had performances at some
prestigious locations, including an installation version at the Guggenheim
Soho.
dumb type suffered a major
tragedy in 1995 when their artistic director and performer, Teiji Furuhashi,
died of HIV‑related septicemia (blood poisoning). A Buddhist funeral
service was held for Furuhashi at ArtScape, a creative community center in Kyoto. Sutra chanting was
accompanied by Teiji’s favorite song, Barbara Streisand’s “People.”
In 1995 dumb type continued to
perform S/N as a tribute to
Furuhashi. They also began to release a series of compact discs and videos documenting
their work to date. With a substantial three‑year grant from the Saison
Foundation philanthropic fund, the collective started to find a devoted world‑wide
cult following. This momentum gave birth to their latest performance, OR. Based on an original concept by
Furuhashi, the performance explores the philosophical issues of life and death.
dumb type calls it “a ‘gray humor’ reflection on the border(s) between life and
death.” (Museum
of Contemporary Art,
Chicago) They examine not the before and after of death but the great in‑between.
The original concept, penned in 1995 by Furuhashi, demonstrates some of the
language and translation complications for Americans:
OR means operating room. It also means choice, one or the other. It
also relates to [OR]ientation, in the sense of physical/directional, sexual,
spiritual orientations. The title has often appeared in brackets meaning that
it focuses on the in‑between‑ness of being, what Buddhists refer to
as a bardo plane.
OR premiered in France
in 1997 and has since toured throughout Europe and Japan. In September of 1998, it ran
at the Barbican Theatre in London.
In the late fall of 1999, OR toured
to four U.S. cities: Portland, Seattle, Minneapolis, and Chicago.
OR In Performance
The Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, 11 December 1999
As audience members drift into
the sold‑out theatre space, they are asked if they would like a pair of
ear plugs. They are warned that the show is extremely loud.
The stage space is filled with a
large, white floor surrounded by a white, semi‑circular wall that pushes
back deep into the stage house. The space is lit by a bright, bluish light that
reflects an eerie glow into the house. The lights go to black and the
performance begins with a series of electronic beeps and a single bar of light
scanning the entire back wall, effectively transforming the space into a giant
heart monitor. Blistering flashes of light burn images of the quickly entering
and exiting performers on the eyes of the audience, giving them a visual
afterlife even though they are no longer on stage. These bursts of light are
accompanied by near deafening explosions of sound which ring in the ears. This
opening sequence, called “Edge,” effectively confuses your senses, mixing what
you may have really seen/heard with near aural/visual hallucinations as the
images remain burned on your eyes and the sound continues to ring in your ears.
A real sense of dread and excitement ensues about what is coming next.
During the 70 minute performance
only a handful of props are used. The only set is the back wall. No performer
ever speaks to the audience (other than one surreal mock‑karaoke song).
The central elements for the performance are the video/computer projections,
the movements and non‑verbal sounds of the live performers, and light and
recorded/computer‑generated music, all of which get equal time.
During the opening sequence,
bodies fling themselves through the space; bodies hug and then collapse. They
are undressed and collapse on hospital gurneys. Others swing chairs and rush
across the stage, the lights only letting us catch glimpses of them. Text
appears on the back wall: “How much the science can control the borders of life
and death.” A series of sections or vignettes based around this concept follow.
“Crying Room” follows the opening
sequence. Three men stretch themselves out onto the gurneys and play dead,
covering themselves with identical white sheets. Each body is approached by a
woman (wife/girlfriend/lover). The women poke, prod, shake, and test to make
sure the men are truly dead. Each woman deals with her now “dead” man in a
different way. One woman pulls out a long, reddish‑orange rope and ties
the body to the table, as if to make sure that he won’t come back to life.
Another woman undresses her man and costumes him like a rock star, giving him
sunglasses, leather pants, and an electric guitar. As these two women finish
their tasks they leave the stage. The remaining woman, who has continued
testing her man’s body for signs of life, begins to quake and cry. The man
rises slightly and a low, guttural wail comes from his body. However it is the
woman’s face and body that give physicality to his wailing. The man’s sound
intensifies, as do the woman’s convulsions.
Images and meditations on death
and dying permeate the show. Medical motifs occur continuously via the
appearance of doctors, hospital trays, gurneys, and lab coats. One of the
female performers dances across the stage and is zipped into a white body bag.
When she is released she is nude (nude bodies in OR seem to suggest corpses) and is taught to walk—in a gentle, yet
bizarrely funny scene—by a team of doctors.
Sound operates as a bridge
between what is happening on stage and the audience, not as underscoring and
not necessarily in an abstract manner but in a very bold way. The sound is
sometimes ear‑popping, building‑shaking, body‑pounding loud,
and at points it operates as a Brechtian‑type alienation device. Large
bursts of noise hit the audience, jolting them into a near flight response; you
can hear the audible gasps of breath around you. At other points the
sound/noise sustains itself for several minutes, building in a high volume that
can’t be ignored.
Sound designers/musicians Ryoji
Ikeda and Toru Yamanaka have built a soundtrack for OR that is often more felt than heard. By playing with pitch and
volume, the audience physically feels the sound waves move through the
performance space and their bodies. Seats rattle during the opening sequences,
the vibrations slowly crawling up the audience members’ bodies as adjustments
are made in the tones and levels of sound.
By the end of the production the
soundtrack makes tangible Furuhashi’s reflection on his mother’s interaction
with life support systems: “Observing the beat from inside her body . . . . I
couldn’t distinguish what was the border between life and death.” (Trippi, 33)
In OR , the soundtrack becomes nearly
overwhelming, and the audience, like Furuhashi, becomes confused about what is
technology and what is human. During the final sequence, white noise is mixed
with a pounding heartbeat that settles into the torsos of the audience. This
metaphorically turns the spectators into temporary cyborgs, confused as to
whether the heartbeats they feel are recorded or their own. The dehumanization
and disconnection that the performers have represented on stage throughout the
evening settles itself into the bodies of their audience.
In dumb type’s work the body, not
the text, is primary. Further, the projected text functions more as
counterpoint than as explanation of the physical action. The text seems to give
directions for various vacations. These directions are a bit like mathematical
“story problems,” and a bit like travel ads, but they inevitably end with
ontological reflections on the journey.
In the final version of OR
the text is minimal. There is [OR]ientation 1:
Imagine yourself
in a car heading South. Over the Alps, for a
vacation. You do not have much time, but once you arrive you will have all the
time in the world. You will be a different person when you get there. Relaxed,
happy, alive. You can sit all afternoon in a sunny café, drinking a casual
glass of wine, eyeing the pretty girls. The newspapers will not follow you
here, not today. All that matters is that the weather is perfect, and even that
does not really matter. You are already there if you want to be, and you know
that is what you want.
And there is a second
[OR]ientation, a Karaoke song, and a short poem:
When life
flashes before your eyes,
which
direction does it go?
The
burning rope. The flickering frame.
The
empty cascade between this moment and the next.
NOISE
In the last 15 years, Japanese
experimental music has moved away from issues of melody and traditional musical
structure towards collage and noise. Recording/performance artists like
Merzbow, Akira Yamamichi, Aki Onda, and Otomo Yoshihide use noise, not music,
as a reference point to create sound environments for meditation, personal
exploration, as well as background soundtracks for everyday life. The result is
a non‑intrusive soundscape or ambient musical atmosphere that creates a
consistent mood or sensation within the listening space. Heavily influenced by
composers Erik Satie and John Cage, these artists seek to create sound/music
that imitates our contemporary urban, suburban, and rural life.
In dumb type’s world, we hear
background thuds, electronic beeps, insipid TV theme show‑like music,
music samples, sound bites, human voice, and a multitude of other mundane
sounds in a rhythmic (sometimes deafening, sometimes quiet) soundtrack. The
sound scape does not change to satisfy Western standards of melodramatic (that
is, drama with music) entertainments but creates a repetitive aural environment‑‑a
meditative ritual space much like the music of Philip Glass and Gavin Bryars.
Boredom enters the audience from a desire for the other, the new, or a change.
Ambient performance art like dumb type’s requests that the audience sit still
for a moment, looking at the images and listening to the sounds for a
relatively long time. The audience is asked to contemplate, not merely
acknowledge, what they experience.
In a dumb type performance
“noise” is brought to the foreground. What is usually left out as technology
cleans up our lives is brought back to prominence in OR. Furuhashi, in a discussion of S/N, describes the concept behind their soundtracks:
On records,
there is lots of noise, but on CDs, there is no noise. Concerts have noise but
DAT tape doesn’t have noise. Everything is moving toward cutting noise—how to
digitalize everything, how to signalize anything. I wanted to look at that
noise carefully. That kind of “cutting noise” seemed to me like cutting
everything people don’t want to see.
As is evident in dumb type’s
choice of subject matter, Furuhashi and his collaborators have often been
intent on looking at and listening to what others may tend to ignore. It only
makes sense that their musical aesthetic should follow suit.
GENDER SUBVERSION
Issues
of gender, body, and sexuality have long been a part of dumb type’s conceptual
project. The London
Times critic of OR focused on the literal when she dismissed the material as
“emaciated:”
We
were also treated to little sketches, often soaked in a kinky eroticism whose
only purpose seemed to be to distract attention from the material's emaciation.
For example, I can think of no other reason for a number featuring two women,
one acting as a dog half strangled by its lead, the other as its sadistic,
bottom‑wriggling owner. (Meisner)
To
those interested in feminism and representations of power, this sequence can be
seen as far more than “distracting.” Gender and sexuality, including
gay/lesbian issues, have been major concerns for dumb type throughout their
history. And while the above‑described pantomime is disturbing and offers
no easy explanation, a closer examination of the sound and visuals offers some
insight.
Not
mentioned in the Times review is the
fact that the sketch becomes a study of dominant and submissive relationship
roles. The dominant owner takes off a slip dress and passes it down the lead to
the bottom‑wriggling submissive dog/woman, who then dons the dress,
stands, and becomes the dominant owner, while her now bra‑and‑panty‑clad
counterpart becomes the dog/owned. This exchange continues as the women cross
the stage, exchanging the dress, and their roles, as they progress. Is this a
male engendered sexual fantasy, or is it a study of Lesbian relationship role
exchange? Does it assert that women are treated like dogs, even by other women?
Does it argue that misogyny can be perpetrated by women as well as men or that
objectification makes women seem like pets to be owned and dominated?
These
interpretations are further complicated by what we hear during the dog/woman
piece. As the owner, each woman marches absurdly along the semi‑circular
stage, tooting militaristic‑sounding tunes into a small megaphone while
her dog partner yips and barks. This gives the whole piece a silly irony that
consciously mocks its own seriousness, subverting any notion of what is proper
or improper in a relationship. As dumb type admits, they like to explore “new
possibilities in human relations.”
THE JOURNEY OF THE INDIVIDUAL
One
recurring image throughout OR is the
lone individual in an overwhelmingly large and empty space. Several moments of
the show depict a single person simply standing on stage while sound and light
play about her body. Each seems to remind us that death—in all its forms—is
ultimately faced alone.
The
first such image is in the opening scene. One of the female performers stands
center‑stage, unmoving, at the far upstage wall of the performance space.
She stands stock‑still as the heart‑monitor‑like beam of
light flashes over her.
About
half-way through the show, another female performer appears center stage. She
is half‑nude (half‑dead?) holding a pile of stainless‑steel
trays. She stands there for a long minute before abruptly dropping the trays
and then slowly cleaning them up. Her body shows marked signs of oppression.
Her stomach is corseted. The nipples of her breasts are attached together by a
long chain. Her feet are bound in excruciatingly high platform heels. Her head
is covered by an apparatus that looks something like a hood and something like
a gas‑mask.
In
another image that occurs near the end of the show in a section entitled “Zero
Radius,” the stage becomes a large‑scale video game. Again, a lone,
unmoving, female figure dressed in white stands upstage center. The walls
suddenly come to life with the view from the windshield of a moving automobile.
The audience is the driver/passenger and the performer center stage gives scale
and perspective to the video like a living hood ornament. The scenery slows
down and speeds up randomly, eventually speeding up to the point where the
walls become a white blur of flickering light. Scenes of buildings, mountains,
and snow all speed past.
The
soundtrack to this last video sequence is a noisy, repetitive rhythm that
speeds up in time with the video. The full sequence is akin to a roller‑coaster
ride or a special effects IMAX film. The peripheral vision of the audience is
filled with the image of the passing scenery. However, there is a slight
alienating effect to the video because it distorts the video images by creating
sections of the wall that are on a slightly different time frame or
perspective, thus calling attention to the video’s own materiality. Similarly,
the still figure of the woman, highlighted by a center strip of light that
tracks the video imperfectly, reminds us of the human being’s place in the
journey. The sequence arrives at an ear‑crunching, sonic crescendo as the
video blurs out. We have reached zero radius—the middle of the circle, the
unknown, the end of the journey. The screen goes white, and the lone woman
stands motionless in the blinding glare.
As
our eyes adjust to the light, the mood changes and several other members of
dumb type wander onto the stage in a section called “40 winks.” They set up
lawn chairs and recline to soft, harp‑like, angelic music. Images of
people and places float softly on the back walls. Serene at last, we’ve made it
to heaven. Or have we? This momentary peace is ripped apart by the final
sequence of the show called “Mutilate” in which lights flash, figures nearly
fly through the hard flashes of light, and screams and grating noises shake the
theatre. Bodies smack into each other and are kicked around. Figures run,
fight, hide, mourn, and in one instance attempt to comfort one another. The
final ending here is not beautiful and relaxing, but violent and intense—a
reminder of life’s struggles rather than hoped for rewards. The stage goes
black, leaving more questions than answers.
SOURCES
Drinkwater,
Ros. “White Lights in a Grey Area.” The
Times (London),
22 September 1998.
Dumb
type. Web site: http://dt.ntticc.or.jp/
Gilbert,
Jenny. “Say It Loud: They’re Dumb and Proud.” The Independent (London),
27 September 1998.
Johnson,
Barry. “Out on the Edge.” Oregonian,
26 November 1999.
Meisner,
Nadine. “Dumb and Dumber.” The Times (London), 29 September
1998.
Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago. OR Program. December 1999.
Trippi,
Laura. “dumb type.” World Art,
February (1996): 28‑33.
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