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Back in 2015, artist and activist Gustav Metzger embarked on one of his last major projects. Famed for introducing art that erases itself, Metzger had spent a lifetime to confronting human struggles from anti-nuclear advocacy to ethical eating. Through a short video message, he made a plea for a worldwide initiative to honor the environment.

“I call upon you for your participation in this global appeal for a day of action to commemorate our planet on 4 November 2015,” he announced, inviting cultural workers to resist the steady eradication of species. “Our task is to help the public recall of the diversity and intricacy in nature … and by doing so the arts will venture into realms that are fundamentally innovative.”

The Creation of Remember Nature

And so the environmental art day was established, a day when creatives nationwide produced pieces to the unfolding climate catastrophe. Jo Joelson, who worked closely with Metzger in his final years, notes his feeling of immediacy. “I sensed a great sense of urgency for him at the close of his days,” she says. “My advice was – don’t delay. No need to pause for sponsorship or for anyone to authorize this. Let’s just do it.”

A Decade Later

Ten years later, Remember Nature did not incited the mass movement across the arts that Metzger had dreamed of, but Joelson believes its influence can still be felt in movements like Culture Declares and environmental protests, as well as in how creatives consider the eco-friendliness of their practices. This is the reason she is reviving it to mark its decade milestone. Included in the key participants participating now are A Man Called Adam and Anya Gallaccio. All participants have produced imagery, shared messages, and produced installations set to be unveiled on November 4, 2025.

Cultivating Awareness

In conversation with Anya Gallaccio, she is on site in Kent, helping plant apple trees that will develop into a spiral-shaped orchard. Working with schoolchildren, her project is somewhat artistic and somewhat instructive. She describes, the design and cultivation sessions have already involved learning about maths (spacing the distances between trees), biology (discussing the hereditary traits), and geography (tracing the stories of how distinct varieties arrived in Britain).

Several the apples were selected because they’ve got amusing labels such as the Bloody Butcher. We have one apple that ‘bleeds’ red juice

“Many of the apples were chosen because they’ve got humorous titles such as the Duck’s Bill,” she explains. “We have one apple that ‘bleeds’ crimson liquid. They all have background narratives. The historical cultivar was brought over by the Romans. The local breed is the apple that fell from a tree and hit the scientist’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 get at a supermarket, so I was encouraging them, when they go shopping, to read the label and see the variety and where they were grown. Ideally it reads Kent!”

Creative Initiatives Throughout Britain

At the capital, Youngsook Choi’s work about extinction will engage visitors looking through Tate Modern on a quest to find the ice masses that have been vanished in recent years. Each glacier will be depicted on the exhibition spaces using ultraviolet markers. Whenever one is found, a alert will occur and a recitation will be performed to honor that individual formation.

At the same time, up in Barrow-in-Furness, a creative will be hosting a public show about our separation from nature, as well as holding a shared meal, cooked from organic, local produce. In another city, Uta Kögelsberger is streaming her Some Kind of Love / Forest Choir, in which local singers undertake a task to use music to heal flora in Newcastle’s Jesmond Dene.

Young Insights

Like Gallaccio, a featured creator will be working with schoolchildren – on the actual event she is hoping to fill an art space in children’s artwork that express their aspirations and concerns for the future. “Youthful expressions are compelling because they’re not as trammelled as adults’,” she says in her recorded message. “What children have to offer to the world is something distinctive and it may inspire a feeling of duty from each person. Children are innocent. They have fears about the future. But let’s not make it about anxiety – it should be about optimism and us ensuring that they get a future.”

Remembrance and Reflection

A participant’s work also resonates for children. As a former drag queen, his Birds Can Fly involves illustrating avians and then embodying them – and for the event he is aiming to represent Liverpool’s famous Liver bird. He is also organizing a itinerant journey of the city, exploring locations that have been part of his ongoing series over the last two decades. That ongoing series began when he faced multiple occurrences of discrimination on a particular day. As a reaction, Harfleet decided to sow a flower at the spot where it happened and record it – the project has since grown to include incidents shared by other people across the world. “I place the plants there but they fade quickly,” says Harfleet. “It seems pigeons like to eat them, so they’re a short-lived memorial.”

The artist selected the bloom not just for the obvious reason – it has long been a slur – but also because its name derives from the French verb, penser, to think. “People connected it with a man who is reflective, and that, of course, is a bad quality,” he says.

The plan on Remember Nature day is to place blooms at new locations and also refresh the memorials in places he has honored before, all the while discussing with those on the walking tour about the incidents and his personal experiences. “We’ve seen quite a few since I last planted,” he says mournfully.

Progressing Optimistically

He desires his work – and