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During 2015, artist and activist Gustav Metzger launched one of his final major projects. Known for pioneering art that erases itself, Metzger had dedicated his life to addressing human struggles from anti-nuclear advocacy to vegetarianism. Via a concise video message, he requested support for a worldwide initiative to celebrate the natural world.

“I, Gustav Metzger, am asking for your participation in this global appeal for a day of action to commemorate our planet on November 4th, 2015,” he stated, urging makers and thinkers to stand against the ongoing loss of living beings. “The mission is to make audiences aware of the abundance and sophistication in nature … and by doing so creativity will explore territories that are fundamentally innovative.”

The Creation of Remember Nature

In this way the Nature Remembrance initiative was established, a day when artists across the country developed works to the ongoing environmental crisis. Jo Joelson, who cared for Metzger in his last days, recalls his sense of urgency. “There was a strong sense of urgency for him at the close of his days,” she says. “I urged him – let’s not mess around. We shouldn’t hold back for funding or for anyone to approve this. Let’s just do it.”

A Decade Later

A decade on, Remember Nature did not triggered the broad uprising across the arts that Metzger had dreamed of, but organizers feel its impact can still be felt in campaigns like artist-led declarations and Extinction Rebellion, as well as in how artists approach the sustainability of their practices. For this purpose she is relaunching it to celebrate its ten-year mark. Included in the key participants taking part currently are Yu-Chen Wang and Anya Gallaccio. They have all designed posters, made video appeals, and created artworks set to be presented on November 4, 2025.

Cultivating Awareness

Interviewing the artist, she is on site in a rural area, assisting with planting apple trees that will grow to form a coiled garden. Engaging schoolchildren, her project is part creative piece and part learning experience. She describes, the design and cultivation sessions have already included learning about measurements (calculating the planting intervals), science (studying the apple’s DNA), and geography (researching the stories of how different apples were introduced to England).

Several the apples were selected because they’ve got funny names such as the other unusual varieties. We have one apple that ‘bleeds’ crimson liquid

“A lot of the apples were chosen because they’ve got amusing labels such as the Duck’s Bill,” says Gallaccio. “We have one apple that releases crimson liquid. Each has background narratives. The ancient variety was imported by the Romans. The Kentish variety is the apple that descended from a tree and hit the physicist’s head.”

Gallaccio wanted the children to be more thoughtfully connected of the natural world and the power we have over it. “In their experience, apples were just things you buy from a supermarket, so I was urging them, when they go shopping, to look on the bag and see what they’re called and the source. Hopefully it says Kent!”

Artistic Responses Throughout Britain

In London, one artist’s work about extinction will include attendees searching Tate Modern on a quest to find the ice masses that have been vanished in modern times. All formations will be illustrated on the museum surfaces using ultraviolet markers. Each discovery, a bell will ring and a recitation will be held to honor that particular glacier.

At the same time, up in another location, a creative will be presenting a public show about our alienation from the environment, as well as holding a community dinner, prepared with regional food. Further north, Uta Kögelsberger is broadcasting her musical project, in which community vocalists undertake a task to sing plants back to health in a green space.

Children’s Voices

Like Gallaccio, a featured creator will be engaging schoolchildren – on the scheduled date she is planning to cover an art space in kids’ letters and drawings that express their dreams and worries for the future. “Youthful expressions are compelling because they’re not as trammelled as mature perspectives,” she says in her public appeal. “The contributions of youth to the world is something distinctive and perhaps it can provoke a feeling of duty from each person. Children are innocent. They have fears about the future. But let’s not make it about worry – it should be about optimism and our responsibility that they get a future.”

Memorials and Memory

Paul Harfleet’s work also connects with children. As a former drag queen, his Birds Can Fly involves sketching winged creatures and then dressing up as them – and for the initiative he is intending to tackle Liverpool’s famous Liver bird. He is also conducting a walking tour of the city, exploring locations that have been part of his ongoing series over the past twenty years. The project began when he endured three incidents of prejudice on a single day. To counter this, Harfleet decided to place a bloom at the location of every incident and record it – the project has since grown to cover events experienced by other people across the world. “I leave the pansies there but they fade quickly,” says Harfleet. “It seems birds consume them, so they’re a ephemeral memorial.”

He picked the pansy not just for the obvious reason – it has long been a derogatory label – but also because its name derives from the French verb, penser, to think. “It became associated with a man who is reflective, and that, of course, is a bad quality,” he says.

The project on Remember Nature day is to place blooms at fresh spots and also replant flowers in places he has marked earlier, all the while conversing with those on the guided walk about the occurrences and his recollections. “I’ve recorded quite a few after my previous work,” he says sadly.

Advancing Positively

Harfleet hopes his work – and