The round sun rose powerfully over the mountain range covered with mist, and the leaves sparkled endlessly in the sunlight. After the rain, the green of the bracken and moss became even more distinct. I felt the sound of the bamboo grove swaying in the wind, the butterflies and bees stretching, and the young shoots sprouting from the stumps with my whole body.
In just a few minutes, I traveled to Seoul Seonyudo Park, Bukhansan National Park, Ulsan Taehwagang National Garden, Baekdudaegan, Hambaeksan, Jeju Gotjawal, and many other oreums. In fact, the place where I was sitting was a pop-up space in Seongsu-dong, Seongdong-gu, Seoul. A large monitor measuring 7m wide and 2.5m high showed beautiful forests all over the country. Maybe it was because they had laid out pine bark and stones indoors and planted fragrant vitex trees. Even though it was a virtual trip, I felt the refreshing happiness of being in an actual forest.
This is a ‘digital healing garden’ created by the Korea Arboretum Management Institute, a public institution under the Korea Forest Service, and Dunamu, a blockchain and fintech company. It is a pop-up garden called ‘Second Forest: Comfort of Trees, Flowers, and Grass’ that will be open for free for one week only until this Saturday (the 7th).
![Could a digital leaf be someone’s ‘last leaf’? [김선미의 시크릿가든]](https://dimg.donga.com/wps/NEWS/IMAGE/2024/09/06/126877594.1.jpg "Could a digital leaf be someone’s ‘last leaf’? [김선미의 시크릿가든]")
When I first heard that “a digital healing garden has opened in Seongsu-dong,” I honestly felt indifferent. ‘If this is a digital garden, how is it different from existing immersive media art expressing flowers and forests? Has the healing effect been proven enough to be promoted as a healing garden?’
But isn’t this what my mother, who went with me to see the forest video, said? “People who are sick or have difficulty moving around can’t go to many places they want to go. But when I see life sprouting like this and hear the birds singing, I think I won’t be discouraged and will be motivated to say, ‘I want to get better soon and go to a place like that. I want to continue living.’ It’s like seeing the last leaf that hasn’t fallen and is still attached, and gaining hope for living.”
I was surprised by the impression that matched the organizer’s intention exactly. Nam Su-hwan, the director of the garden promotion department of the Korea National Arboretum, said, “Since the space for creating gardens in the city is limited, we decided that we could expand the garden infrastructure by utilizing Korea’s excellent digital technology. There are research results that show that smart gardens or natural landscape screens have a healing effect. This means that people with limited mobility can be healed just by looking at landscapes that are difficult to access. After the pop-up exhibition ends, we plan to move it to a hospital and install it. Patients will be comforted by the digital garden, and we will be able to monitor the long-term effects.”
Then why Seongsu-dong? “Since it is a place where many people gather, I expected it to generate social interest in healing gardens. I also tried to combine digital and analog by creating an actual garden with grass and flowers in the backyard.”
In Seongsu-dong, the mecca of pop-up spaces, the response from the young generation to this ‘Second Forest’ is extraordinary. Not only do they receive over 1,000 visitors a day, but there are also over 1,000 posts on Instagram. Most of them are certification shots taken by people in their 20s and 30s. When I actually went there, they were lying on bean bags, smelling the scent of herbs, and writing ‘comforting messages to myself’ on petal-shaped stickers. I read those ‘comforting petals’ carefully. ‘Be generous to yourself’, ‘You’re doing well’, ‘I love you so far’, ‘Let’s go to college next year’, ‘Your path is right. Be confident’…
Director Hye-ryeong Cho of Jo Kyung-ha-da-yeol-eum, which planned the exhibition, said, “The younger generation does not consider comfort to be something grand. If they just go somewhere and feel fresh and happy in that space, that is comfort and ‘small but certain happiness.’ I think this digital garden is an act of creating a temporary landscape. If we continue this kind of experimental project in the city, wouldn’t it instill in people the awareness that they need gardens? The MZ generation can encounter nature by sharing images of these places on Instagram without having to go to Jeju or Gangwon. It’s an experience where boundaries become blurred.”
This exhibition is smaller in scale than immersive media art, but it is meaningful in that it is a new attempt that combines digital and healing. The ESG activities of Dunamu Corporation, which invests in the future of forests and gardens, are also worthy of applause. However, rather than a healing garden based on medical evidence, the title of the exhibition would be more appropriate as a ‘garden of comfort.’ Seongsu-dong is now a garden as a consumption behavior of the young generation that gains small happiness by uploading photos taken at ‘hot places’ rather than a garden where people sweat and communicate with living things.
The Japanese word ‘Komorebi’ (木漏れ日, sunlight shining through tree leaves) became widely known in Korea through the movie ‘Perfect Days’. I think of that word every time I see sunlight shining through tree leaves. As the number of gardens in our cities increases, will the number of pure Korean words conveying green comfort increase? Will the digital leaves in the virtual forest where technology meets become the ‘last leaves’ that comfort our aching hearts?
2024-09-06 12:42:28