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In 2015, visionary and advocate Gustav Metzger embarked on one of his last major projects. Known for pioneering art that erases itself, Metzger had devoted his career to confronting human struggles from nuclear disarmament to plant-based living. Via a concise video message, he requested support for a worldwide initiative to honor the environment.

“This is my appeal for your participation in this international summons for a day of action to commemorate our planet on the fourth of November, 2015,” he declared, urging artists and creatives to resist the continuing disappearance of flora and fauna. “Our task is to help the public recall of the diversity and intricacy in nature … and by doing so art will enter realms that are fundamentally innovative.”

The Birth of Nature Remembrance

And so Remember Nature came into being, a day when artists across the country developed works to the unfolding climate catastrophe. Jo Joelson, who cared for Metzger in his later life, notes his sense of urgency. “I sensed a great sense of urgency for him at the end of his life,” she says. “My advice was – don’t delay. We shouldn’t hold back for funding or for anyone to green light this. Let’s just do it.”

A Decade Later

After ten years, the initiative did not triggered the broad uprising across the arts that Metzger had dreamed of, but supporters think its impact can still be observed in campaigns like cultural advocacy groups and climate activism networks, as well as in how creatives consider the eco-friendliness of their practices. This is the reason she is restaging it to celebrate its 10-year anniversary. Included in the 18 lead artists taking part currently are A Man Called Adam and prominent artists. All participants have produced imagery, recorded calls to action, and created artworks set to be revealed on 4 November 2025.

Sowing Change

Interviewing the artist, she is working outdoors in Kent, assisting with planting apple trees that will grow to form a coiled garden. Engaging schoolchildren, her project is somewhat artistic and half educational workshop. As she explains, the preparation and sowing sessions have already included learning about measurements (measuring out the planting intervals), genetics (exploring the apple’s DNA), and origins (researching the backgrounds of how different apples arrived in Britain).

Several the apples were chosen because they’ve got humorous titles such as the Bloody Butcher. We have one apple that produces scarcolored sap

“Several the apples were picked because they’ve got amusing labels such as the Bloody Butcher,” says Gallaccio. “We have one apple that ‘bleeds’ red juice. Each has stories behind them. The decio apple was brought over by the Romans. The local breed is the apple that fell from a tree and hit Isaac Newton’s head.”

She hoped the children to be more thoughtfully connected of nature and the influence we have over it. “To many of them, apples were just things you buy from a supermarket, so I was prompting them, next time they were out, to read the label and see their names and their origin. Ideally it reads Kent!”

Creative Initiatives Nationwide

Within the city, a participant’s project on disappearance will involve participants exploring an art institution on a journey to find the seven major glaciers that have been disappeared in the past decade. All formations will be depicted on the exhibition spaces using ultraviolet markers. Whenever one is found, a alert will occur and a performance will be held to honor that individual formation.

Elsewhere, up in Barrow-in-Furness, a creative will be putting on a free exhibition about our alienation from the environment, as well as holding a shared meal, prepared with organic, local produce. Over in Newcastle, an artist is streaming her environmental performance, in which local singers embark on a mission to perform for vegetation in Newcastle’s Jesmond Dene.

Young Insights

Following this approach, Cornelia Parker will be engaging schoolchildren – on the actual event she is hoping to decorate an art space in youth creations that document their hopes and fears for the tomorrow. “Youthful expressions are compelling because they’re not as trammelled as adults’,” she says in her public appeal. “What children have to offer to the world is something distinctive and hopefully it will stimulate a feeling of duty from each person. Children are innocent. They have concerns for tomorrow. But let’s not make it about fear – it should be about optimism and making sure that they have a tomorrow.”

Tributes and Thoughts

Another artist’s work also appeals to children. As a former drag queen, his avian project involves illustrating avians and then embodying them – and for Remember Nature day he is aiming to tackle a local symbol. He is also staging a walking tour of the city, exploring locations that have been part of his long-term work over the last two decades. The project started after he endured several events of discrimination on a single day. To counter this, Harfleet decided to place a bloom at the spot where it happened and record it – the project has since spiralled to incorporate experiences shared by other people across the world. “I place the plants there but they don’t often last,” says Harfleet. “Reportedly pigeons like to eat them, so they’re a ephemeral memorial.”

Harfleet chose the flower not just for the clear connection – it has long been a term of homophobic abuse – but also because its name derives from the French verb, penser, to think. “It was linked to a man who is reflective, and that, of course, is a terrible thing,” he says.

The project on 4 November is to plant pansies at additional sites and also refresh the memorials in places he has previously memorialised, all the while talking to those on the itinerant journey about the incidents and his personal experiences. “We’ve seen quite a few since I last planted,” he says mournfully.

Moving Forward with Hope

The artist wishes his work – and