Welcome to theLAND OF MOURNING CALM
A creative practice devoted to grief, memory, and the interior landscapes shaped by loss
Land of Mourning Calm is a multidisciplinary worldbuilding practice. I developed it because I had few places to put the ache of losses that society doesn’t tend to acknowledge, validate, or make rituals around.
It creates containers for experiences that resist resolution. For grief that lingers, memory that fractures, meaning that trickles in slowly, if at all.
The name reworks “Land of Morning Calm,” a Western-coined, orientalist phrase* historically used to describe Korea. Here, morning becomes mourning—a deliberate shift from serenity to sorrow, from surface calm to interior weight. Not peace as an aesthetic. Rather, grief as a lived condition.
This practice does not aim to heal, fix, or transform. It does not offer closure, reassurance, or future-oriented promises.
Instead, it makes room for remembrance of what persists.
*The phrase “Land of Morning Calm” was popularized in Western travel writing (notably in 19th-century English texts) and does not reflect how Koreans historically described their own land. Scholars note this translation as a Western literary framing rather than an indigenous name. (See Seongnam Kim, A History of Korea: From Land of Morning Calm to States in Conflict; and Names of Korea, Wikipedia).
WAYS TO ENTER THIS WORLD:
The practice takes shape through a small number of offerings. These are temporary containers designed to hold attention, memory, and presence.
Writing & Publications
Essays and short-form texts exploring grief, memory, and interior life. Some are publicly accessible; others are released in limited or time-bound form.
Facilitated Spaces
Small, intentional gatherings for grief, loss, transition, and identity disruption through practice of material forms. The first in-person gathering will be at the Jung Center in Evanston for licensed mental health professionals.
Visual & World-Building Projects
This includes visual work and environments that give form to grief and interior life without turning them into explanations or neat lessons.
A BOUNDARY
Land of Mourning Calm is not therapy, coaching, or spiritual instruction. It does not replace professional care. It does not offer diagnosis, treatment, or guaranteed outcomes.
It offers attention.
It offers containment.
It offers a place to stay with what persists.