Ghosts building a wall

In Chinese folklore, ghosts building a wall (simplified Chinese: 鬼打墙; traditional Chinese: 鬼打牆; pinyin: Guǐ dǎ qiáng; lit. 'ghosts beating the wall') refers to ghosts trapping people in a certain area at night. There is a folktale about a traveler who walks in circles, as if ghosts continually built walls to block his intended path.^[1][2] In some descriptions, real walls or trees appear.^[3] The conventional solution is to stop, cover one's face with one's hands, then look again to see that the way is clear.^[3]

The contemporary Chinese artist Xu Bing referenced this folktale with his artwork Ghosts Pounding the Wall in 1988.^[4] With a crew of workers, he took ink impressions of the Great Wall of China and displayed them in the United States.^[4]

See also

• Nurikabe