Dumb Type

Published on the occasion of their exhibition at Munich's Haus der Kunst, this publication presents an insight into the multifaceted worlds crafted by the pioneering Japanese collective Dumb Type. Founded in 1984 by students from Kyoto City University of Arts, Dumb Type's varied installations and performances deployed cyberpunk imagery in order to critique a highly 'informatised' consumer society that was concurrently rendered passive via the unceasing deluge of data and technological development. The publication contains an essay by the curator, Damian Lentini, an interview with founding member Shiro Takatani, and numerous installation pictures from the exhibition at the Haus der Kunst. The texts examine the continuous investigations conducted by Dumb Type along the interface between technological progress and the human body, and they critically scrutinize the manner in which digital media and technology constitute a formative and irreversible part of our current experience.