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In 2015, creative and campaigner Gustav Metzger embarked on one of his last major projects. Famed for introducing auto-destructive art, Metzger had spent a lifetime to confronting global challenges from nuclear disarmament to plant-based living. In a brief video message, he issued a call for a international event to celebrate the natural world.

“This is my appeal for your engagement in this international summons for a day of action to remember nature on the fourth of November, 2015,” he announced, urging cultural workers to resist the continuing disappearance of living beings. “Our responsibility is to make audiences aware of the richness and complexity in nature … and by doing so art will enter domains that are naturally imaginative.”

The Birth of Environmental Reflection

And so the Nature Remembrance initiative was born, a day when cultural practitioners throughout Britain developed works to the escalating planetary emergency. Jo Joelson, who cared for Metzger in his later life, remembers his feeling of immediacy. “He had a great sense of urgency for him at the close of his days,” she says. “I just said – let’s not mess around. We shouldn’t hold back for sponsorship or for anyone to authorize this. Let’s just do it.”

A Decade Later

A decade on, Remember Nature may not have incited the mass movement across the arts that Metzger had dreamed of, but supporters think its legacy can still be observed in campaigns like cultural advocacy groups and climate activism networks, as well as in how creatives consider the environmental impact of their work. This is the reason she is reviving it to celebrate its decade milestone. Part of the key participants participating now are Cornelia Parker and Anya Gallaccio. Each has produced imagery, made video appeals, and created artworks set to be unveiled on November 4, 2025.

Cultivating Awareness

When speaking to Anya Gallaccio, she is out in a field in the countryside, helping plant apple trees that will grow to form a circular grove. Collaborating with schoolchildren, her project is somewhat artistic and somewhat instructive. According to her, the design and cultivation sessions have already incorporated learning about measurements (spacing the distances between trees), biology (studying the hereditary traits), and history (researching the journeys of how distinct varieties arrived in Britain).

Many of the apples were selected because they’ve got humorous titles such as the other unusual varieties. We have one apple that ‘bleeds’ scarcolored sap

“A lot of the apples were chosen because they’ve got funny names such as the other unusual varieties,” she explains. “We have one apple that ‘bleeds’ crimson liquid. Each has histories attached. The decio apple was imported by the Romans. The local breed is the apple that dropped off a tree and landed on Isaac Newton’s head.”

The artist aimed the children to be more consciously engaged of the environment and the power we have over it. “For a lot of them, apples were just things you buy from a supermarket, so I was urging them, on their next shopping trip, to look on the bag and see what they’re called and the source. Perhaps it indicates Kent!”

Creative Initiatives Across the Country

At the capital, one artist’s work about extinction will engage visitors exploring an art institution on a journey to find the seven major glaciers that have been vanished in recent years. All formations will be drawn on the exhibition spaces using special pens. When located, a bell will ring and a performance will be conducted to remember that individual formation.

Elsewhere, up in a northern town, an artist will be putting on a public show about our alienation from the environment, as well as holding a communal feast, prepared with sustainable ingredients. Over in Newcastle, a participant is broadcasting her Some Kind of Love / Forest Choir, in which local singers embark on a mission to sing plants back to health in a green space.

Children’s Voices

Similar to other artists, a featured creator will be working with schoolchildren – on the scheduled date she is hoping to fill Cambridge’s Kettle’s Yard in youth creations that express their hopes and fears for the tomorrow. “Children’s words and images are impactful because they’re not as restricted as adults’,” she says in her call to action video. “The contributions of youth to the world is something distinctive and hopefully it will provoke a sense of responsibility from everyone. Kids are unbiased. They have anxieties about what’s next. But let’s not make it about anxiety – it should be about positivity and our responsibility that they get a future.”

Tributes and Thoughts

A participant’s work also resonates for children. As a former drag queen, his feathered initiative involves sketching winged creatures and then performing as birds – and for the initiative he is planning to tackle Liverpool’s famous Liver bird. He is also conducting a itinerant journey of the city, visiting various sites that have been part of his ongoing series over the recent decades. This endeavor commenced following he endured three incidents of discrimination on a particular day. In response, Harfleet decided to place a bloom at the location of every incident and photograph it – the project has since grown to incorporate experiences reported by other people across the world. “I leave the pansies there but they are temporary,” says Harfleet. “It seems wildlife enjoys them, so they’re a short-lived memorial.”

He picked the flower not just for the obvious reason – it has long been a slur – but also because its origin is the French verb, penser, to think. “It became associated with a man who is thoughtful, and that, of course, is a terrible thing,” he says.

The intention on 4 November is to place blooms at new locations and also refresh the memorials in places he has honored before, all the while talking to those on the guided walk about the incidents and his personal experiences. “I’ve recorded quite a few after my previous work,” he says mournfully.

Progressing Optimistically

Harfleet hopes his work – and