‘Breathe in,” says Ersin Han Ersin. “Breathe out.” Look, I feel like saying, I’ve been doing this inhale-exhale malarkey for decades. But what Ersin is trying to get me to do, inside this dimly lit warehouse on the banks of the Thames, is synchronise my breath with the soundtrack to a Colombian Amazonian rainforest, or rather one that has been digitally simulated. Only then will I properly be able to enter Breathing with the Forest, a virtual reality installation created by the Marshmallow Laser Feast collective.
Ersin, its co-creative director, is urging me and my fellow visitors to transcend our individual selves, overcome species hubris, and merge with nature. We should remember that our every exhale is an airy gift to trees, who return the compliment by supplying us with oxygen that flows into our own tree-like lungs and throbs out as blood from the heart, off out to branching arteries that feed our every cell. It’s all a bit like eco yoga.
