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During 2015, visionary and advocate Gustav Metzger launched one of his ultimate significant endeavors. Recognized for pioneering art that erases itself, Metzger had spent a lifetime to responding to human struggles from nuclear disarmament to ethical eating. In a brief video message, he requested support for a global day of action to remember nature.

“This is my appeal for your engagement in this global appeal for a day of action to commemorate our planet on the fourth of November, 2015,” he declared, urging makers and thinkers to oppose the ongoing loss of flora and fauna. “The mission is to make audiences aware of the richness and complexity in nature … and by doing so the arts will venture into realms that are inherently creative.”

The Birth of Environmental Reflection

And so Remember Nature was established, a day when artists across the country produced pieces to the escalating planetary emergency. Jo Joelson, who worked closely with Metzger in his last days, remembers his sense of urgency. “He had a strong sense of urgency for him at the end of his life,” she says. “My advice was – don’t delay. Let’s not wait for sponsorship or for anyone to authorize this. We should proceed.”

After Ten Years

After ten years, the initiative hasn’t quite triggered the broad uprising across the arts that Metzger had dreamed of, but supporters think its influence can still be observed in campaigns like Culture Declares and environmental protests, as well as in how creatives consider the eco-friendliness of their practices. That’s why she is reviving it to mark its ten-year mark. Among the key participants involved this time are Cornelia Parker and prominent artists. Each has designed posters, recorded calls to action, and developed pieces set to be unveiled on 4 November 2025.

Sowing Change

Interviewing the artist, she is out in a field in Kent, helping plant apple trees that will create a spiral-shaped orchard. Engaging schoolchildren, her project is somewhat artistic and somewhat instructive. According to her, the design and cultivation sessions have already included learning about measurements (calculating the gaps in the orchard), biology (studying the hereditary traits), and geography (mapping the stories of how various cultivars were introduced to England).

Several the apples were chosen because they’ve got amusing labels such as the other unusual varieties. We have one apple that produces scarcolored sap

“A lot of the apples were picked because they’ve got funny names such as the Bloody Butcher,” says Gallaccio. “We have one apple that ‘bleeds’ scarlet-colored sap. They all have histories attached. The decio apple was brought over by the Romans. The Flower of Kent is the apple that fell from a tree and struck the scientist’s head.”

She hoped the children to be more consciously engaged of nature and the influence we have over it. “In their experience, apples were just things you buy from a supermarket, so I was encouraging them, when they go shopping, to read the label and see the variety and the source. Ideally it reads Kent!”

Artistic Responses Throughout Britain

In London, Youngsook Choi’s work about extinction will involve participants looking through a major gallery on a quest to find the frozen formations that have been lost in modern times. Every ice sheet will be drawn on the gallery’s windows and walls using special pens. Whenever one is found, a chime will sound and a recitation will be performed to honor that specific ice mass.

Meanwhile, up in Barrow-in-Furness, a creative will be hosting a free exhibition about our alienation from the environment, as well as organizing a communal feast, made using regional food. In another city, a participant is sharing her environmental performance, in which regional performers begin a project to use music to heal flora in a local park.

Young Insights

Like Gallaccio, another participant will be engaging schoolchildren – on the day itself she is hoping to decorate a cultural venue in children’s artwork that capture their aspirations and concerns for the years ahead. “Youthful expressions are powerful because they’re not as restricted as grown-ups’,” she says in her call to action video. “Young people’s input to the world is something distinctive and hopefully it will provoke a feeling of duty from everyone. Youth is pure. They have anxieties about what’s next. But this shouldn’t be about fear – it should be about optimism and making sure that they have a tomorrow.”

Tributes and Thoughts

Another artist’s work also resonates for children. With a background in performance, his Birds Can Fly involves sketching winged creatures and then dressing up as them – and for Remember Nature day he is planning to tackle Liverpool’s famous Liver bird. He is also organizing a itinerant journey of the city, visiting various sites that have been part of his long-term work over the recent decades. This endeavor began when he endured three incidents of homophobic abuse on a single day. As a reaction, Harfleet decided to place a bloom at the location of every incident and photograph it – the project has since grown to include incidents reported by other people across the world. “I leave the pansies there but they don’t often last,” says Harfleet. “It seems pigeons like to eat them, so they’re a short-lived memorial.”

Harfleet chose the pansy not just for the clear connection – it has long been a slur – but also because its origin is the French verb, penser, to think. “It was linked to a man who is contemplative, and that, of course, is a bad quality,” he says.

The plan on the event day is to plant pansies at new locations and also refresh the memorials in places he has marked earlier, all the while conversing with those on the itinerant journey about the occurrences 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