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2023. Nov VOL.668
- 2023. Nov VOL.668
- ENG
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2023. Nov VOL.668
Knowing that the talent one has can help someone can be a significant driving force for them to move on with their life. Playing a small role in saving the planet is indeed a rewarding and blissful endeavor. Hie Koo uses her talent in art to help save the Earth.
“I didn’t really think I would become a webtoon writer when I decided to major in art. Actually, I studied textile design in college, but after I became aware of how serious the climate crisis has gotten, I decided to draw comics about climate crisis.” Koo started to realize the severity of climate crisis two years ago when the entire country was struck by COVID-19. The children’s art academy where she taught children art closed down following the pandemic outbreak, forcing her to take a hiatus from work. She decided to make the most out of this hiatus in her career by thinking about and doing things that she couldn’t find time to do when she was busy with work.
“The rainy season continued for 54 days that year. The following year, cherry blossoms sprouted flowers earlier than in all the previous years since the 1930s. It really struck me that something was going terribly wrong. If I had been working, I probably wouldn’t have had the time to think about it seriously. But since I was not preoccupied back then, I could afford to pay attention to these abnormal weather events, and began to wonder why these events occur.” A small interest in climate change motivated her to write a webtoon which was published in a book titled <Climate-Human>, raising public awareness of the climate crisis.
Hie Koo once participated in a climate crisis-themed exhibition, which gave her satisfaction, and she was glad to have an opportunity to work with great people on a theme meant to promote public good. However, she thought the works on display should be made more easily accessible to people. Only those who visited the exhibition could see the works, which made her think about how she could make these works more easily accessible to more people. After thinking long and hard, she chose webtoons as a channel of communication. Since webtoons are easy to access, she could reach more people to talk about the climate crisis and receive positive feedback quickly as well. She felt happy and rewarded when she read readers’ comments that after reading her webtoon, they learned so much about climate change that they did not know previously. It is absolutely necessary and important to ensure that people are aware of the climate crisis. Whatever one does, it is almost impossible to get only positive feedback from others. There are usually negative feedback and unfavorable comments to deal with, so one needs to move forward with one’s conviction. She was no exception in this regard. Some people complained about her webtoon for encouraging people to put a brake on using modern conveniences. “Use less plastic and use reusable shopping bags instead of disposable plastic bags when shopping, and all the other messages in my webtoon may sound like a boring lecture.” Nevertheless, if we do not change our behavior, the climate crisis will only get worse and won’t abate, unless we take these messages seriously and put them into practice. She cannot stop what she is doing because she knows the consequences all too well, so she chooses to work harder on drawing about climate crisis-themed webtoons in response to all the negativity that comes with her work. She believes that the climate crisis is so serious that we cannot afford to complain about the inconvenience of taking prudent steps to help save the Earth.
“Although some people may find my webtoon and the message in it a little bit too challenging to embrace in their daily life, I want to keep staying devoted to it, as long as it helps save the Earth to make more people get interested in tackling the climate crisis.”
Countries around the world are making every effort feasible to protect the environment. In response to this trend, Korean companies are becoming increasingly concerned about ESG management, and carbon neutrality campaigns are often run in South Korea. All these efforts accumulate to keep us going even amid the climate crisis. Giving up on modern conveniences in our daily lives is probably more difficult than conducting large-scale environmental campaigns involving the government and large corporations.
“Things that we need to use less of for the good of the planet are what makes our lives easier like plastic wrapping materials, plastic straws, and cars. It is not easy at all for us to live without such things that we are used to using to make our life easy.” Every day, the author shares with her readers the little changes in habits that she makes in her everyday life. Change take place when you take on small-scale challenges. She is fighting a lonely battle as she struggles to embrace challenges and make changes in the hopes of having a minimal harmful impact on the Earth. Her conviction remains firm that the cuts she draws for her webtoon today will help the future recover a greener world.
