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During 2015, visionary and advocate Gustav Metzger embarked on one of his last major projects. Recognized for creating art that erases itself, Metzger had spent a lifetime to addressing human struggles from anti-nuclear advocacy to ethical eating. Via a concise video message, he issued a call for a global day of action to remember nature.

“This is my appeal for your involvement in this worldwide call for a day of action to reflect on the environment on 4 November 2015,” he announced, inviting cultural workers to stand against the continuing disappearance of species. “Our responsibility is to make audiences aware of the richness and complexity in nature … and by doing so art will enter realms that are fundamentally innovative.”

The Creation of Remember Nature

In this way Remember Nature came into being, a day when artists across the country developed works to the ongoing environmental crisis. An organizer, who worked closely with Metzger in his last days, notes his drive for action. “I sensed a profound sense of urgency for him at the close of his days,” she says. “My advice was – let’s not mess around. No need to pause for sponsorship or for anyone to approve this. Take action immediately.”

After Ten Years

Ten years later, the project may not have triggered the broad uprising across the arts that Metzger had hoped for, but Joelson believes its legacy can still be felt in movements like Culture Declares and environmental protests, as well as in how makers handle the environmental impact of their practices. That’s why she is reviving it to celebrate its ten-year mark. Included in the key participants taking part currently are Yu-Chen Wang and Anya Gallaccio. All participants have designed posters, made video appeals, and produced installations set to be revealed on November 4, 2025.

Cultivating Awareness

When speaking to Anya Gallaccio, she is working outdoors in the countryside, helping plant apple trees that will create a circular grove. Collaborating with schoolchildren, her project is part creative piece and part learning experience. She describes, the preparation and sowing sessions have already incorporated learning about maths (calculating the gaps in the orchard), genetics (exploring the apple’s DNA), and geography (mapping the stories of how various cultivars were introduced to England).

A lot of the apples were picked because they’ve got humorous titles such as the Bloody Butcher. We have one apple that releases scarcolored sap

“Several the apples were chosen because they’ve got humorous titles such as the Duck’s Bill,” she explains. “We have one apple that produces red juice. Every one carries histories attached. The historical cultivar was brought over by the Romans. The Flower of Kent is the apple that fell from a tree and struck Isaac Newton’s head.”

Gallaccio wanted the children to be more thoughtfully connected of the natural world and the control we have over it. “For a lot of them, apples were just things you get at a supermarket, so I was prompting them, when they go shopping, to check the packaging and see the variety and where they were grown. Perhaps it indicates Kent!”

Cultural Projects Nationwide

Within the city, Youngsook Choi’s Book of Loss will engage visitors exploring Tate Modern on a journey to find the seven major glaciers that have been vanished in the past decade. All formations will be illustrated on the gallery’s windows and walls using invisible ink. Whenever one is found, a alert will occur and a reading will be conducted to honor that individual formation.

At the same time, up in Barrow-in-Furness, an artist will be hosting a free exhibition about our separation from nature, as well as holding a communal feast, cooked from sustainable ingredients. Further north, an artist 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 local park.

Children’s Voices

Following this approach, another participant will be collaborating with schoolchildren – on the day itself she is hoping to fill an art space in kids’ letters and drawings that document their hopes and fears for the future. “Kids’ art are powerful 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 it may stimulate a sense of responsibility from each person. Youth is pure. They have anxieties about what’s next. But let’s not make it about fear – it should be about positivity and making sure that they get a future.”

Remembrance and Reflection

Another artist’s work also resonates for children. With a background in performance, his Birds Can Fly involves sketching winged creatures and then performing as birds – and for the initiative he is planning to represent a local symbol. He is also conducting a walking tour of the city, exploring locations that have been part of his long-term work over the recent decades. The project started after he endured three incidents of prejudice on a particular day. To counter this, Harfleet decided to plant a pansy at the site of each occurrence and document it – the project has since spiralled to incorporate experiences reported by other people across the world. “I leave the pansies there but they are temporary,” says Harfleet. “Reportedly pigeons like to eat them, so they’re a short-lived memorial.”

Harfleet chose the bloom not just for the direct association – it has long been a slur – but also because its origin is the French verb, penser, to think. “People connected it with a man who is reflective, and that, of course, is a negative trait,” he says.

The project on Remember Nature day is to place blooms at additional sites and also replant flowers in places he has marked earlier, all the while discussing with those on the guided walk about the occurrences and his memories of them. “There’s been quite a few following earlier installations,” he says with regret.

Advancing Positively

Harfleet hopes his work – and