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During 2015, creative and campaigner Gustav Metzger initiated one of his ultimate major projects. Famed for introducing auto-destructive art, Metzger had dedicated his life to confronting global challenges from anti-nuclear advocacy to ethical eating. Via a concise video message, he requested support for a worldwide initiative to honor the environment.

“I, Gustav Metzger, am asking for your engagement in this international summons for a day of action to remember nature on November 4th, 2015,” he declared, inviting artists and creatives to stand against the continuing disappearance of living beings. “Our responsibility is to make audiences aware of the diversity and intricacy in nature … and by doing so the arts will venture into domains that are fundamentally innovative.”

The Creation of Environmental Reflection

In this way the environmental art day was born, a day when cultural practitioners throughout Britain produced pieces to the ongoing environmental crisis. An organizer, who worked closely with Metzger in his final years, remembers his feeling of immediacy. “There was a great sense of urgency for him at the close of his days,” she says. “I just said – we must act now. No need to pause for sponsorship or for anyone to green light this. We should proceed.”

After Ten Years

Ten years later, Remember Nature hasn’t quite triggered the broad uprising across the arts that Metzger had dreamed of, but Joelson believes its influence can still be observed in movements like Culture Declares and Extinction Rebellion, as well as in how creatives consider the eco-friendliness of their work. For this purpose she is reviving it to celebrate its 10-year anniversary. Included in the key participants taking part currently are A Man Called Adam and prominent artists. They have all designed posters, shared messages, and produced installations set to be presented on 4 November 2025.

Sowing Change

Interviewing Anya Gallaccio, she is on site in a rural area, assisting with planting apple trees that will develop into a coiled garden. Collaborating with schoolchildren, her project is part creative piece and part learning experience. As she explains, the preparation and sowing sessions have already incorporated learning about maths (calculating the distances between trees), genetics (studying the genetic makeup), and geography (tracing the journeys of how distinct varieties were introduced to England).

Many of the apples were picked because they’ve got amusing labels such as the other unusual varieties. We have one apple that releases crimson liquid

“A lot of the apples were picked because they’ve got humorous titles such as the Bloody Butcher,” the artist notes. “We have one apple that produces scarlet-colored sap. Every one carries background narratives. The decio apple was introduced by the Romans. The local breed is the apple that fell from a tree and landed on Isaac Newton’s head.”

The artist aimed the children to be more actively aware of the environment and the influence we have over it. “For a lot of them, apples were just things you get at a supermarket, so I was prompting them, when they go shopping, to check the packaging and see their names and the source. Hopefully it says Kent!”

Cultural Projects Across the Country

At the capital, one artist’s Book of Loss will involve participants searching Tate Modern on a mission to find the ice masses that have been lost in recent years. All formations will be depicted on the exhibition spaces using ultraviolet markers. Whenever one is found, a bell will ring and a reading will be performed to commemorate that particular glacier.

Meanwhile, up in a northern town, a creative will be putting on a open display about our alienation from the environment, as well as organizing a communal feast, prepared with organic, local produce. Further north, a participant is sharing her Some Kind of Love / Forest Choir, in which community vocalists embark on a mission to sing plants back to health in Newcastle’s Jesmond Dene.

Children’s Voices

Following this approach, Cornelia Parker will be engaging schoolchildren – on the day itself she is aiming to cover a cultural venue in children’s artwork that capture their hopes and fears for the tomorrow. “Kids’ art are powerful because they’re not as inhibited as grown-ups’,” she says in her recorded message. “What children have to offer to the world is something quite unique and it may inspire a sense of responsibility from us all. Kids are unbiased. They have fears about the future. But this shouldn’t be about anxiety – it should be about positivity and our responsibility that they have a tomorrow.”

Remembrance and Reflection

Another artist’s work also connects with children. With a background in performance, his avian project involves drawing birds and then dressing up as them – and for the event he is planning to address a local symbol. He is also organizing a walking tour of the city, stopping at places that have been part of his long-term work over the past twenty years. That ongoing series started after he faced several events of prejudice on a single day. In response, Harfleet decided to sow a flower at the site of each occurrence and photograph it – the project has since grown to cover events reported by other people across the world. “I leave the pansies there but they fade quickly,” says Harfleet. “Apparently wildlife enjoys them, so they’re a very temporary memorial.”

The artist selected the bloom not just for the direct association – it has long been a slur – but also because its origin is the French verb, penser, to think. “It was linked to a man who is contemplative, and that, of course, is a terrible thing,” he says.

The intention on Remember Nature day is to sow flowers at new locations and also renew the tributes in places he has previously memorialised, all the while conversing with those on the itinerant journey about the events and his recollections. “We’ve seen quite a few after my previous work,” he says with regret.

Advancing Positively

Harfleet hopes his work – and