In conversation with Chinese designer Francois Yang from Shanghai.

Q _ Questions by Marianne Meijer

A  _ Answers by Francois Yang

ʻHello Francois, its nice to meet you, my name is Marianne Meijer and Iʼm a Dutch product design student from the Netherlands. I want to thank you for your time to speak with me about some questions I have. I’m working now in a summerschool / intern project for 5 weeks in China to contribute to the project Re:Wire, a project in Shanghai with studio BoomWehmeyer. It is the first time I am in China and have encountered a lot of information, sights and people.

The last 4 weeks I have done a lot of fieldwork on different topics in Shanghai to get a good understanding of what it can mean for me to be outside my work and living context. Also to see how I can learn and transform this into my own design perspective and Wire my own perspective. I liked to talk with you so I could have a conversation with a Chinese designer and have get a few of my many questions answered by a local designer. Thank you for your time.ʼ

Q _ ‘You are educated as a product designer and now living and working in Shanghai doing a lot of different work. You worked in China but also in Europe. With all your experience until now what could you say you learned from the Chinese Design education? What are the most important elements you have been taught?ʼ

A _ ʻI donʼt know how you judge learning from your Dutch education.  I feel I did not  learn a lot, it is hard. Lets say it like this, I spend 5 years in Tongji university in Shanghai. My course was 5 years, it covers the first years with architecture, interior design, product and visual communication. In the final year you hit some direction where you want to go into.

I think itʼs for me that college life is like a long time of doing what you want to do, until the last year. From the teachers part I must say, their concern is not my concern. They have a different focus. Tongji university is quite technical orientated even in architecture, their main concern is - make something, make it practical and make it happen.

And not think of something interesting, deep or crazy and then try to figure our how to present this or make it happen. I nearly could not graduate from university because of my diploma project, Iʼll explain. It was about doing something what I wanted, it was interesting. It was with an Italian designer Aldo Cibic,  who is famous in Italy and a old student of Sottsass. This man was part of Venice biennale and he made a good topic on metro lines and Shanghai is planning so much on metro lines so I really like this. In fact he was purposing something to reflect the change of the cities and I came up with idea of Metro lines through research. I think most of the techniques you will have to learn during the real working experience and not actually in school.

I was imagining a lot on metroʼs that it was like a life spot and people can move around city easy between these characters in the city and made collages and concepts things on this. Then they ask what your doing and in the end you just design technical metro station. Itʼs not what I want to do. In the end I designed a shuttle bus to cover the journey between residential area and the metro station which normally is a 10 - 20 min walk distance. In the end they say something and you make a change otherwise you canʼt graduate.ʼ

ʻ Also I must say,  it is very...how do i say that, you can only meet 1 or 2 teachers  in your life who really influence you in later design life. Most of them are just clouds who pass by, at least thats my view on teachers.ʼ

Q _ ʻYou speak about that the university is so technical, is this everywhere? Are there other universities in China who are more specific towards design, like being more conceptual?ʼ

A _ ʻI think if you say from product point of view that most of them are quite concerned about just the technical part. Making things practical. There are so many stupid things also with this teaching, they are concerned more about the student; when they graduate, how many people will have a  job, what kind of job doesnʼt really matter. The university sees it as a task to first find a job, its not that you being inspired by the university.

I think also that half of the teachers are not so interesting, it is a difficult story to say.

Most teachers, especially in design have own companies. So they have already a steady or glory-full job, thats what shows for them as a name card. Let’s go a bit deeper, specially in postgraduate education the students are like cheap labour to their mentor, the teachers hands out the project to their students and profit a lot from it.

I don’t know the situation in Holland but here this really isn’t the good way, at least not for me as designer. They  teachers get paid outside school from their projects, the university is like a company. You can be a professor, get nice name card and get paid not from your teaching but from your company work. Itʼs very double.

It is ok to some degree but to me but itʼs about how you control the good balance in teaching. Itʼs not only about how deep you have search in the books but also you should spare proper energy on good teaching. Iʼm very critical to the teaching here maybe I sound like a outsider Chinese (laughs).ʼ

Q _ What do you think we as Dutch designers can learn from the Chinese design? 

A _ I mean that is..quite difficult. Maybe not so easy for the good answers. For me itʼs really hard to be a designer in China. The market is so devised. The skill of China is Europe, you can say easy when it is Dutch, Italian or a German design. I mean I can tell it, I can see it in the design but China is as big as europa. It is so big that it is nearly impossible to design in China design style. The designer should have the ability to adept to different levels in Chinese market. You have to work for different markets here to survive. I had to design washing machine in China once for a factory.

Here they have this Twin Top, itʼs different then the European one, itʼs a different design you know, During this research for the washing machine they even wash potatoes in the washing machine, just to try out. There are things to discover in China, its the hard part for the Chinese designer , you have to adept into other areaʼs and this can be really difficult. Its,how do you say that, for example how you deal with interpreter of the company, that is a different story. Somehow they donʼt believe you or just want quick money, or give you bad sample. You somehow have to be very devoted to design or just be a copier or a computer user.

Q _ ʻWhat is your drive then, seeing you still design in China and still have clear opinion on this?ʼ

A _ʼYou can check my website for some of my ideas, for me itʼs very conceptual. Itʼs not commercial, I still want to express and...  but I also have to live and do commercial work. When I have time and energy I really will make something that is interesting and that has a meaning. That is reason why Iʼm not working in a company, like a big design company. Lets say you have to work a lot of time and most projects there are nonsense. If you can

live in that environment if the company, itʼs easy to loose yourself. That why I always keep away from this and work rather alone or be a teacher, I do also invited professor work.ʼ

Q _ ‘You studied in Italy, in what way did that effect you’re way of thinking on design?ʼ

A _ ʻWhy I went to Italy? This was, how do you say that. I am more interested in things that are unplugged, without ,things that do not run by electra such as home applications. I think itʼs also a good country to go for education. What I got form that experience? Ok,let me think.. lets say it is two parts. One is, I am more aware of the importance of research during the process. I wanted that experience to get more time in researching and reading. 

Part two is, it just gives you a other feeling. Here  in China you sometimes feel lack of design but there in Italy you get a overdose, itʼs a other feeling. Design was everywhere in Italy, it was so much you get almost tired of it (laughs). It was very good tho, I visited factories like B&B, Cassina and design friends there. I went there with some academy trips and I found it more interesting. I was amazed by how small the factory is compared to in

China. I find that different then here, itʼs much larger here. Also it is that, yes.. these companies are really design company orientated. There it is more on feeling and being aware of importance of research in the work. They have reasons to exist.ʼ

Q _ What is your view on products here? How do people in China use products? What do they value most in a product? 

A _ On the product? They do not value the product (laughs). The product values the people. Lets say, kinda rough that only 5% Chinese people buy a product that they think they should value for appearance. So what it would mean for them. For example the car industry here. The really big cars and real wagon feeling, the automobiles here are economy making but itʼs also changing. The oil price is crazy high but in other things itʼs still the same. Lets say when they buy its not really about what I can get from it, like a connection or feeling but they just buy it because other people have it also. Itʼs about a image the product, yeah.. yeah.. (sighs).ʼ

Q _ ‘Knowing all this, how do you wish to continue in the future then with you’re work, you have any  big dreams?’

A _ ʻWell, bigger dreams? Itʼs like..wait, Iʼll tell you what I think about the future. I donʼt know what future it is, it is like a faith and want to liev and work that I do everything with conscience and not regretful of what Iʼm doing. I donʼt say want to say I want a bright future or be super rich or super big but just take life step by step and do it with my best. Also hope that it goes right..ʼ

Q _ ‘When I look at my feeling of safety or fundaments such as the things I feel most comfortable with like my family heritage, local understanding or costumes etcetera. What do you see then as you’re fundaments, heritage, what seem important for you?ʼ

A _ ʻMy heritage? Can you be more specific, you mean like cultural or food ? You eat potatoes right ? Haha, sorry that is a joke. First I think I should like to make the answer into two parts.  First its about the word Safety, because I have been to Germany for half year and to Italy and in the Provence and traveled through Europe. Whenever I go there I donʼt have the problem of safety, maybe I am to numb? Or something like that, whatever. I donʼt feel you need a circle around you to protect yourself. I am here in your country and I try to learn and melt myself in with your society.

It is more a Chinese way,  itʼs more that sort of thinking. When you go to  a new place and you follow it with your own habits you are fine, it is sort of chinese saying (speaks it out in Chinese).ʼ Do you really believe you can get connection with local people in Shanghai then?ʼ 

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Marianne answers, ʻ Yes I think so, I tried to, I spend a lot of time outside the last weeks and also had a full 12 hour day in the same street and field to connect and understand the people and living in that location. Seeing the food, trying to talk and communicate, be among the people. I know Iʼm a different person but by trying to sit on street and making kinds of connections with them. I really wanted to say more that, when your here, like I am now, I  think back of  how different my home is. I start to see a lot of values and things at home I donʼt experience here.ʼ

Q _ ʻWhen your not in your country you see things different donʼt you have the same?ʼ

A _ Of course I have these feelings, I mean itʼs hard to get in general good Chinese food, it is  something I miss (smiles) but most of the part. I really donʼt miss many things when I go there it is for the experiences and I try to indulge myself in society. Try to feel or think what they local do. I mean this helps you to gain more,to have more deeper experience and feeling about a place. Of course you see things different, when Iʼm in China I donʼt think of China and when Iʼm not here then I do think of China. Ok, Iʼm try to express myself in the complete way. For me when Iʼm in foreign country

things are that, everything is in a bigger scale. Itʼs not just specific on food or on what we do or on habits. I think that my main concern is that my thinking is about society, the structure, how people think,  the relationships that are there, thinking on a deeper levelʼ.

Q _ ‘In the history of Holland religion played a big role in daily life of people and the government, it was safety point for the people. Now for the young generation it seems not so important anymore and they seek it in other things. Where, in you’re opinion, comes the chinese safety feeling from? 

A _ ʻAha, did religion play a big role? Ok, here totally not, absolutely not, the only religion is money but this is not the new religion, that would be the worst thing you could say. It has been here a long process in last 100 years. Well it is China. So many things have happened here; all these dynasties in China, then this stopped abrupt also the written language changed in speaking, all the national wars, the second world war and the rise of China communist party. That last one became a new religion. The cultural revolution it really appeared to be a dream.ʼ

ʻItʼs really funny. There is one sentence in China, it is famous. It is from Deng Xiaoping, who became a important leader for communistic period. The sentence is long (speaks it in Chinese). It just the problem that the people only remember first part of the sentence and not the second part. Itʼs about one of the basics of being this communistic country. It means the following, the first part is; “We allow some certain people to get rich first.”

ʻThen the second part that people forget about these days is;ʼ “so we can reach to a goal of common wealth”. ʻThe form was good, the initiative, but it got lost, people value people only for how much the have.ʼ

Q _ Do you think there is a new role model or some idol for the Chinese people that they live up to?

A _ ʻWell, a typical role model, like what a typical chinese role model can be ? Iʼm first, well, Iʼm maybe, Ok I donʼt want any misunderstanding, I am very proud to be a Chinese.ʼ ʻIt is just because that when I go deeper in the culture of what we have and also of how we thought in ancient time, itʼs been really amazing! I discover still so many things and values.

It is really hard to describe this by the word. The history is really something I find almost like a Way. Not only a way just to be as a human but also as to think things in a different ways. From our education we hardly got anything that connected to the past, our ancient history. This is also that we Chinese, well.. we have to learn it by ourselves, out of interest but not naturally from the environment. Itʼs really a pity. Now they say now more then before that Confucianism is more the role model for whole China. Only some people are starting to believe this as new road. Not a model with money orientation but maybe its right. Maybe you say typical role model  but maybe one from city and one from village fields.

In city, its different, you have to split this from the village. It is... kind of pity life to me. The typical role model as people that live in city is like a drill. They study hard when your a teenager student so you can go to university and get good job. Then spend half money on your house every month and have a child and a car. After couple years with hard working you retire and you finished payment for the house. Itʼs for me really kinda of pity you know.  Of course, you try to get more money, a lot of money that is possible but i think in in the end that half of the people, half of the majority will fail do be lucky while other will succeed. For this I donʼt think its different then role model of the Western people or the Chinese.ʼ

ʻI live my life and I choose this as it is but lets say, when we look from Chinese standard it is not that successful. My half old university class has more money and stuff then I do, some of my friends talk to me and care for me. It is good, they donʼt laugh at me. They sayʼ “Yang, you should think about the future not just wander around, get married, money and kids.” ʻThat is what normal Chinese people think but I seem to disagree.ʼ

Q _ When you see how the other Chinese people think and live, in what way do you think then that globalization effected the Shanghainese people? 

A _ Well, let me think for a while..

I think it is more or less still that globalization still remains in appearance level. Of course they have more idea of what it is. The people know more of what the Western look like and a developed country looks like. So somehow you can say it becomes an appearance model for Chinese. That why you have so much fake western antique and stuff. It makes me sick ! So many fake things, just to have the appearance, now you can see how

globalization affects people or we could say how it affects in a material level. But if you only see the material and didʼnt get how they came to this, you lost the roots.ʼ

 

Q _ ‘Something more on the Green design topics, I  was reading  on your web site that you have an interest in changing environmental problems by researching people using habits. Do you think that environment can be more solving users habits?’

A _ ‘I can imagine that different kind of habits can be changed, there are enough wrong habits.  And for China? I mean in china? Well I think, stop dreaming about cars! Yeah, letʼs say stop dreaming about cars!

Q _ ‘Can you tell me a bit more on your opinion about Green design? How you feel about this?’ 

A _ ʻGreen design (looks around and thinks)? I think that how Chinese think about green design and what the global perspective is on green design is totally different. The Chinese people still think that green is attached to how green it looks around them.

Last year you might have noticed here, there is a ban, a ban for plastic bags. They stopped giving free bags in super market, you pay now for them and its more special.Thatʼs cool! Then now there are so many designs that come out that with exactly the same shape, nothing new and with same patterns. More of these so called environment free bags. I thought what are we doing? If you change appearance that does not make sense, that how I came up for a idea of my shopping bag. That was my  reaction, Iʼm really tired of these different shopping bags better make something interesting, at least thats my approachʼ

Q _ ‘What is you’re opinion on how China’s is dealing with environmental problems?’ 

A _ The government, itʼs not that good, well I canʼt say..ehh..(thinking).

Letʼs say that I think that our government takes this issue quite serious. Honestly but China is also so big and the questions can be not solved so easily. There are different regions and different policies and also different ideas about this. The Shanghai local government is for example very aware but in the west or in a village you canʼt see this. They are not aware of these facts. You can not take 1 example and say see that how it is. There is not 1 model for the problems.

Maybe itʼs like this, our government and basic intuition is a rapid world economy. This is a main concern and now they realize problem of environment, so many things need to be solved here. I think the procedure isnʼt radical enough, it should be more radical to go green.

‘If you want to be absolute green then it is a barrier for the economy of course. Solving the green problems. For every government itʼs a problem to solve this. You have to find the balance, you have to find economy grow and the green but itʼs also that the green industry creates jobs, we need to see what happens.At some point in China they do recycle things better then Western world, you can not call it industry here but the people individual collect stuff and recycle. It is the local people coming around every week or few days to collect all plastic, metal cans and cardboard.

Letʼs say, we still can benefit from the local attitude. Our economy benefits to some way from the low costs that in other countries cant work. There is an advantage.ʼ

Q _ ‘The last weeks I did on different topics fieldwork, like city, people and material and at the end of every week I wrapped this up by taking the most important words out. Do you want to read them through and see how you agree of disagree? Of feel related to how I see Shanghai? Maybe even you have some new words for me?’

A _ ‘Looking through your words, I do recognize some of them. Some are very clear for me also.  Also some I really do not understand or agree with, like what do you mean by flexible constructions or movable? Or do you mean more mobility here? the words are very compressed for the huge amount you have seen and the huge amount

what we have here, our life, our history and what china will become.’

‘The research is very important in design but also in yourself, here in China we have a saying for this ( speaks it out in Chinese), the original words means you win the battle within you then already appear to be a king. Reach to be a stronger person.”

- For more information about this conversation, Marianne or Francois, the program or future scenario’s please contact us.

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