City of Gaia

albero1987

〈Breath of the City〉, 2023.

AR.
Commissioned by the Asia Culture Center. Courtesy of the artist.

〈Dynamic Dialogue of the Forest〉, 2023.

Mixed media, dimensions variable.
Commissioned by the Asia Culture Center. Courtesy of the artist.

〈Silent Scream of the Flora〉, 2023.

Single-channel video, color, sound, 1 min. 10 sec.
Courtesy of the artist.

In a city composed of forests of buildings and asphalt roads, it is not always easy to perceive life and nature. It sometimes seems that the urban environment and nature are exclusive to one another. The artist employs AR technology to create a variety of digital plants that can exist in an urban landscape.

In City Breath, digital plants demonstrate how nature could maintain a place in a busy city landscape, raising awareness of the necessity of spaces in which nature and humans can coexist. Silent Screams of the Flora (The Silent Cries of Plants) depicts environmental changes caused by destructive human activities that have adverse effects on plants. Depicting plants desperately resisting or crying out, this work leads the audience to reconsider the environmental impact of human lifestyles and imagine how humans, plants, and machines could better interact and coexist. Dynamic Dialogue of the Forest portrays trees that build close relationships with one another in an attempt to survive in a harsh urban environment. Trees warn their neighbors of external intrusions by giving out a scent or passing nutrients through their roots. The artist highlights these features of trees demonstrating co-existence and interactions between different beings and creates a virtual community of plants as a social presence.