he udesigabl zhag qig ranslated by yiyu wag 2,211 years ago, the powerful warlord Xiang Yu invited his rival, Liu Bang, to a banquet in Hongmen. The banquet, conceived as a trap to kill Liu Bang, started in a tense atmosphere. The hosts and guests took their seats. Xiang Yu faced east, and his consultant, Fan Zheng, south. Liu Bang’s consultant Zhang Liang chose to face Xiang Yu so that Liu Bang faced Fan Zheng instead of Xiang Yu, hinting that Liu Bang had no intention to act against Xiang Yu. At that moment, Xiang Yu was leading 400,000 soldiers, and Liu Bang only 100,000. The two armies were only about forty miles apart. In order to avoid direct conflict with Xiang Yu and survive the banquet, Liu Bang needed to sheji (devise some strategies). During the meeting, Fan Zeng raised a piece of circular jade three times to signal Xiang Yu to take action, but Xiang Yu did not respond. Fan Zeng then summoned Xiang Zhuang to perform a sword dance with the intent to kill Liu Bang. At this pivotal point, the banquet was interrupted by Fan Kuai, whose arrival was arranged by Zhang Liang to distract Xiang Yu. When Fan Kuai impressed all the attendees with his bold manner of consuming the wine and pork, Liu Bang fled under the pretext of going to the toilet. At the banquet, Zhang Liang, on behalf of Liu Bang who was reportedly “drunk and left early” presented a jade disc to Xiang Yu, and a jade square ruler to Fan Zeng, who furiously broke the jade disc and predicted, “This mean fellow (Xiang Yu) is not worthy of my service. It should be Peigong (Liu Bang) who defeats Xiang Yu and conquers the country.” This story shows the importance of sheji (design)1 in political and military conflicts. Thanks to Liu Bang’s chao sheji (hyper strategy),2 a strategy that allows him to outsmart his enemies, Xiang Yu loses the opportunity to kill Liu Bang, who later becomes the emperor of the Han dynasty. Sheji refers to something planned or intended in the Chinese context. Han Feizi, a third-century B.C. Chinese thinker, explained the meaning of the character she in relation to shi as follows: “If shi is something determined by nature, it is not shi. By shi, I mean something planned by humans.” Ji designates plans or strategies, as expressed in Guanzi Quanxiu: “A one-year plan is for growing crops; a ten-year plan, planting trees; a lifetime plan, cultivating men.” According to Emperor Gaodi’s Main Record in the Book of Han, the prime minister Chen Ping devised a miji (secret strategy), which helped the emperor break the siege of the Huns. Sheji (design) has played a critical role in history. It manifests human desires, as well as intellect and spirituality. The stories of the "Trojan Horse" and "Borrowing the Enemy’s Arrow"3 have always been associated with the winner’s ingenuous design. Inventions such as the compass and the steam engine illustrate design’s contribution to material culture. Intellectual and spiritual activities are often multidimensional. It is significant that more than 2,000 years after the Hongmen banquet, we bring together a variety of contemporary cutting- edge works under the title HyperDesign at this Biennale. It is necessary to examine design from a philosophical and spiritual perspective. It is noteworthy that design has brought about both self-realization and self-restraint. We need to envision another kind of design, a going beyond and a return. 2006 Shanghai Biennale: HyperDesign. Courtesy of the Shanghai Art Museum. I want to name it wufa sheji (the undesignable), something that cannot be designed. Li Zhi, the renowned sixteenth-century writer, remarks, The truly talented writer does not intend to write in the beginning. He has something strange, indescribable in his mind. He wants to utter something in his throat, but dares not. He often holds many words in his mouth but cannot find a place where he can speak out. Over time, these things accumulate to the point where they cannot be held anymore. As a result, when things touch his eyes and heart, he will chant expressively. He will grab anothers’ cup and drink to soothe his troubled mind. He will express his frustration. The extraordinary things he expresses will last for a thousand years. 4 Li Zhi suggests that marvelous writings are not something that can be designed. Similarly, the undesignable elements can also be found in other arts, as the saying indicates, “Without a touch of madness, one cannot create good artworks.” Wufa sheji, which is made up of wu (no), fa (principle), she (plan or arrange), and ji (measure), refers to something that cannot be measured by set standards. Fa designates measures or standards. Guanzi, a seventh-century B.C. thinker, for example, mentions a set of measures: chicun (for measuring length), mosheng (for drawing straight lines), guiju (for drawing circles and squares), hengshi (for weighing), douhu (for measuring volume), and jiaoliang (for measuring angles). The concept of the undesignable implies that design is essentially a spiritual activity, which cannot be made or evaluated by the above-mentioned tools. The notion of the undesignable expresses our aspiration for a realm of freedom and new possibilities. Ji Kang is an accomplished third-century writer and musician known for his love of personal freedom and spiritual cultivation. One day, he traveled to a place named Huangyang near Luoyang and decided to spend the night in a pavilion there. Ji Kang started to play the zither at night, ignoring the fact that the pavilion had been associated with many murders. Suddenly, he heard “Bravo, bravo.” Ji Kang continued playing the zither and asked, “Who is it?” Ji Kang learned from the response that it was a ghost who had been wandering for several thousands of years. The ghost told him, “I heard you playing the zither. The music is very refreshing and beautiful. Since I was a zither music lover, I come over to listen.” The ghost further explained that since he had been killed and mutilated, it would be inappropriate for him to meet Ji Kang in person. But he asked Ji Kang to forgive his terrible appearance because he loved Ji Kang’s music so dearly. Undisturbed, Ji Kang responded, “It is already late at night. Why don’t you appear? Our bodies do not matter that much. They are only appearance and skeleton.” The apparition came up to Ji Kang, carrying his head in the hand, and said, “Your music is so refreshing and enlightening that I feel as if I have come back to life.” Ji Kang and the ghost started to talk about music. The ghost even used Ji Kang’s zither to play a few pieces. He taught Ji Kang the best piece, “Guang Ling San.” But the ghost asked Ji Kang to keep his name and this piece a secret. When the morning came, the ghost said farewell to Ji Kang, “Our encounter occurred in just one night. We could be together for a thousand years. How can I not feel melancholy about this long separation.”5 The piece “Guang Ling San” did not survive. But the strange tale of Ji Kang’s encounter with the ghost sheds light on the idea of the undesignable element in art making. Words are no longer adequate to express the thoughts and feelings the story evokes. Perhaps, the door to the undesignable opens at the moment when language fails. If the story about the sage and ghost seems to be a rather remote and bizarre example of the undesignable, let us take a look at one of the most common ingredients of our life, qing (emotion). 2 Tang Xianzu, a famous dramatist of the Ming dynasty, wrote: “Humans are born with feelings. Pensiveness, happiness, anger, and sadness are triggered by small things. They (emotions) can be expressed in powerful singing and movement. They can be released and extinguished in a minute, or last for several days. .”6 On a similar note, the well-known play Palace of Eternal Youth by Hong Sheng begins with, “[Something] moves metal and stone, responds to heaven and earth, shines in the day, and makes history. We can see the strong emotive elements in stories about faithful court officials and filial sons. The sage [Confucius] did not delete songs from the Zheng and Wei states in the Book of Poetry.7 I borrow the ideas and compose the music. I create new lyrics based on Tai Zhen Wai Zhuan. Everything comes from emotion.” 8 Another play, The Peony Pavilion, by Tang Xianzu, is known as one of the most classic love stories in the history of Chinese drama. The playwright, observes, however, “The most difficult thing to express in the world is emotion.” He seems to suggest that emotions, when not conveyed enough in real life, find their expressions in the mad and the fantastic in theatre.9 The Peony Pavilion defies the line between reality and dream, yang jian (world of the living) and yin jian (world of the deceased). The main character, Du Liniang, is not dead. She is only temporarily hidden in a yin jian (room) by the playwright, who constructs several touching love scenes in the absence of one of the characters in love. The device he employs is to place the main characters in different rooms. One character can only observe his/her lover, who is in the other room, through a kind of monitor, such as the portrait of Du Liniang.