프로젝트 순성의 복원

Purpose of the study

The project “Digital Humanities City: Restoration of Soon-sung” considers Hanyang Dosung as an architectural interface that embodies the history of the city and the stories of its people and unravels the hidden times and spaces behind it. This project brings Hanyang Dosung back to life through the humanistic values of the literature, philosophy, history and art spawned by the fortress wall’s 600 years and broadens the public's access to such content by using a location-based AR (Augmented Reality) mobile application that plays AR content on specific locations along the HD. This project provides humanistic knowledge in digital form and expands the range of visitors’ real-time experiences of HD by providing layers of information while they are at the site. The site thus becomes the interface to information. It reinvigorates the experience of HD. This project has three specific goals:

- The study uses a digital humanities approach to explore the intersection between information technology and humanities. It not only engages with digital reproduction of humanities content, but also tries to enhance human experiences of the city by incorporating different digital media technologies and providing integrated humanistic interpretations of the historical site.

- The project democratizes humanities discourses by shifting the focus from written historical documents to artistic productions and human testimonials. More specifically, it is concerned with both historical facts and folk tales, and thus reconstructs grassroots memories as the subject of history. This project functions as a platform for the bottom-to-top storytelling that has never been told in recorded histories of Seoul.
- In doing so, this project restores the meaning of Soon-sung in multiple ways. In Korean, soon-sung can mean three different actions when we write them in Chinese while they sound the same in Korean. These Chinese characters all are pronounced as soon-sung, but they can be interpreted in three different ways.
- Soon-sung (巡城): Playing around the fortress wall, admiring scenery and making wishes

During the modernization process of Seoul, Hanyang Dosung was physically damaged and was symbolically separated from the lives and play of the people. It became a symbol of the past, although it still plays an important role in the lives of Seoul’s citizens located in the center of Seoul. This project aims at a humanistic reconstruction of Hanyang Dosung in ways that enable the lives and play of the people to be naturally combined with the function of Hanyang Dosung.

- Soon-sung (順性): original nature

The project restores the architecture of Hanyang Dosung in the form of augmented reality. There are six parts of Hanyang Dosung which were damaged and disappeared during the Japanese colonial period and the modernization process. The Seoul Metropolitan Government recognized the importance of Hanyang Dosung and initially planned the physical reconstruction of the site, but historians and cultural heritage experts opposed and insisted that physical reconstruction of the fortress wall would only undermine its authenticity. So, the government embedded small six copper plates inscribed with the words "Hanyang Dosung Soon-sung Road” on the damaged sites. We will visualize the lost parts of the fortress through the augmented reality program, and audiences can see the original appearance of the architecture through their mobile phones.

- Soon-sung (純性): pure nature

A city is a center of human life. However, a city can often become an empty concept that is separated from the lives of the people who make their homes there. This project uses folklore, literature and art as historical sources and provides a new perspective for understanding the city by bringing grassroots memories into research data. Through this process, “Digital Humanity City: Restoration of Soon-sung” restores the pure nature of a city that is by the people, of the people, and for the people.

Digital Humanities City: Restoration of Soonsung

Purpose of the study

‌Steps in the Development of the Project

‌Expected Benefits

People