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During 2015, creative and campaigner Gustav Metzger initiated one of his final important works. Recognized for creating self-destructive creations, Metzger had spent a lifetime to confronting global challenges from anti-nuclear advocacy to ethical eating. Via a concise video message, he requested support for a worldwide initiative to celebrate the natural world.

“This is my appeal for your engagement in this worldwide call for a day of action to reflect on the environment on 4 November 2015,” he announced, encouraging cultural workers to oppose the steady eradication of flora and fauna. “The mission is to make audiences aware of the richness and complexity in nature … and by doing so creativity will explore territories that are fundamentally innovative.”

The Inception of Remember Nature

Thus the environmental art day came into being, a day when creatives nationwide created responses to the unfolding climate catastrophe. One of the curators, who worked closely with Metzger in his last days, recalls his feeling of immediacy. “There was a great sense of urgency for him at the final chapter,” she says. “My advice was – let’s not mess around. We shouldn’t hold back for sponsorship or for anyone to green light this. We should proceed.”

Ten Years On

After ten years, Remember Nature hasn’t quite sparked the widespread change across the arts that Metzger had hoped for, but Joelson believes its impact can still be felt in campaigns like artist-led declarations and Extinction Rebellion, as well as in how creatives consider the eco-friendliness of their methods. That’s why she is restaging it to mark its 10-year anniversary. Among the featured creators involved this time are Yu-Chen Wang and other notable figures. They have all produced imagery, recorded calls to action, and produced installations set to be presented on 4 November 2025.

Cultivating Awareness

Interviewing one participant, she is out in a field in Kent, helping plant apple trees that will develop into a coiled garden. Engaging schoolchildren, her project is somewhat artistic and half educational workshop. She describes, the planning and planting sessions have already incorporated learning about maths (spacing the distances between trees), biology (discussing the apple’s DNA), and history (researching the backgrounds of how distinct varieties came to the UK).

Several the apples were picked because they’ve got funny names such as the Duck’s Bill. We have one apple that releases crimson liquid

“Several the apples were selected because they’ve got amusing labels such as the Duck’s Bill,” says Gallaccio. “We have one apple that releases scarlet-colored sap. Each has stories behind them. The decio apple was imported by the Romans. The Flower of Kent is the apple that fell from a tree and landed on the physicist’s head.”

The artist aimed the children to be more consciously engaged of nature and the influence we have over it. “For a lot of them, apples were just things you find in a supermarket, so I was urging them, next time they were out, to read the label and see what they’re called and their origin. Perhaps it indicates Kent!”

Creative Initiatives Throughout Britain

At the capital, a participant’s work about extinction will include attendees exploring a major gallery on a quest to find the frozen formations that have been vanished in recent years. Every ice sheet will be depicted on the exhibition spaces using ultraviolet markers. Each discovery, a chime will sound and a recitation will be held to commemorate that particular glacier.

At the same time, up in Barrow-in-Furness, a creative will be hosting a open display about our separation from nature, as well as hosting a community dinner, made using organic, local produce. Further north, an artist is sharing her musical project, in which regional performers undertake a task to sing plants back to health in Newcastle’s Jesmond Dene.

Youth Perspectives

Like Gallaccio, Cornelia Parker will be collaborating with schoolchildren – on the scheduled date she is planning to decorate a cultural venue in youth creations that express their dreams and worries for the tomorrow. “Children’s words and images are compelling because they’re not as trammelled as grown-ups’,” she says in her recorded message. “The contributions of youth to the world is something distinctive and perhaps it can stimulate a awareness of obligation from us all. Kids are unbiased. They have fears about the future. But it isn’t meant to be about fear – it should be about positivity and us ensuring that they get a future.”

Remembrance and Reflection

A participant’s work also connects with children. With a background in performance, his avian project involves drawing birds and then performing as birds – and for the initiative he is aiming to represent Liverpool’s famous Liver bird. He is also conducting a guided walk of the city, visiting various sites that have been part of his Pansy Project over the last two decades. This endeavor commenced following he experienced multiple occurrences of prejudice on a single day. To counter this, Harfleet decided to place a bloom at the location of every incident and photograph it – the project has since spiralled to include incidents shared by other people across the world. “I leave the pansies there but they fade quickly,” says Harfleet. “Apparently birds consume them, so they’re a ephemeral memorial.”

Harfleet chose the pansy not just for the direct association – it has long been a term of homophobic abuse – but also because its name derives from the French verb, penser, to think. “It became associated with a man who is contemplative, and that, of course, is a terrible thing,” he says.

The plan on the event day is to place blooms at fresh spots and also renew the tributes in places he has honored before, all the while talking to those on the walking tour about the incidents and his personal experiences. “There’s been quite a few following earlier installations,” he says sadly.

Moving Forward with Hope

He desires his work – and