🔗 Share this article

Back in 2015, creative and campaigner Gustav Metzger launched one of his ultimate major projects. Known for pioneering self-destructive creations, Metzger had spent a lifetime to confronting human struggles from nuclear disarmament to vegetarianism. In a brief video message, he requested support for a worldwide initiative to celebrate the natural world.

“This is my appeal for your participation in this international summons for a day of action to remember nature on November 4th, 2015,” he stated, urging artists and creatives to resist the steady eradication of living beings. “Our responsibility is to help the public recall of the abundance and sophistication in nature … and by doing so the arts will venture into domains that are fundamentally innovative.”

The Creation of Environmental Reflection

And so the Nature Remembrance initiative was established, a day when cultural practitioners throughout Britain created responses to the unfolding climate catastrophe. One of the curators, who worked closely with Metzger in his later life, recalls his feeling of immediacy. “I sensed a great sense of urgency for him at the final chapter,” she says. “I urged him – don’t delay. No need to pause for financial support or for anyone to green light this. Take action immediately.”

Ten Years On

Ten years later, the initiative may not have triggered the broad uprising across the arts that Metzger had hoped for, but Joelson believes its impact can still be felt in movements like artist-led declarations and climate activism networks, as well as in how creatives consider the environmental impact of their practices. This is the reason she is reviving it to celebrate its ten-year mark. Among the featured creators taking part currently are Yu-Chen Wang and prominent artists. All participants have produced imagery, recorded calls to action, and developed pieces set to be unveiled on 4 November 2025.

Cultivating Awareness

When speaking to Anya Gallaccio, she is on site in Kent, cultivating apple trees that will develop into a circular grove. Engaging schoolchildren, her project is somewhat artistic and half educational workshop. According to her, the design and cultivation sessions have already incorporated learning about mathematics (spacing the gaps in the orchard), science (exploring the apple’s DNA), and origins (mapping the journeys of how distinct varieties came to the UK).

Many of the apples were selected because they’ve got amusing labels such as the Bloody Butcher. We have one apple that releases red juice

“A lot of the apples were picked because they’ve got humorous titles such as the Bloody Butcher,” she explains. “We have one apple that releases crimson liquid. Each has histories attached. The decio apple was introduced by the Romans. The Kentish variety is the apple that dropped off a tree and landed on the scientist’s head.”

The artist aimed the children to be more thoughtfully connected of the natural world and the influence we have over it. “For a lot of them, apples were just things you buy from a supermarket, so I was encouraging them, on their next shopping trip, to read the label and see their names and their origin. Perhaps it indicates Kent!”

Creative Initiatives Across the Country

Within the city, one artist’s project on disappearance will engage visitors searching a major gallery on a journey to find the frozen formations that have been lost in modern times. Each glacier will be drawn on the museum surfaces using special pens. Each discovery, a bell will ring and a recitation will be held to commemorate that individual formation.

Meanwhile, up in Barrow-in-Furness, Maddi Nicholson will be hosting a open display about our disconnection from the land, as well as hosting a community dinner, cooked from organic, local produce. Further north, an artist is broadcasting her musical project, in which community vocalists begin a project to perform for vegetation in Newcastle’s Jesmond Dene.

Youth Perspectives

Like Gallaccio, a featured creator will be working with schoolchildren – on the scheduled date she is planning to decorate Cambridge’s Kettle’s Yard in children’s artwork that capture their dreams and worries for the tomorrow. “Youthful expressions are impactful because they’re not as inhibited as adults’,” she says in her public appeal. “What children have to offer to the world is something truly special and perhaps it can provoke a sense of responsibility from everyone. Youth is pure. They have concerns for tomorrow. But let’s not make it about worry – it should be about positivity and making sure that they get a future.”

Tributes and Thoughts

Another artist’s work also appeals to children. As a former drag queen, his feathered initiative involves illustrating avians and then performing as birds – and for the event he is planning to represent a local symbol. He is also conducting a guided walk of the city, visiting various sites that have been part of his long-term work over the past twenty years. This endeavor commenced following he endured multiple occurrences of discrimination on a one occasion. As a reaction, Harfleet decided to place a bloom at the site of each occurrence and record it – the project has since expanded to include incidents shared by other people across the world. “The flowers remain there but they don’t often last,” says Harfleet. “Reportedly wildlife enjoys them, so they’re a very temporary memorial.”

The artist selected the flower not just for the direct association – it has long been a term of homophobic abuse – but also because its etymology comes from the French verb, penser, to think. “It was linked to a man who is thoughtful, and that, of course, is a bad quality,” he says.

The plan on the event day is to sow flowers at fresh spots and also refresh the memorials in places he has marked earlier, all the while talking to those on the walking tour about the incidents and his recollections. “We’ve seen quite a few following earlier installations,” he says sadly.

Progressing Optimistically

He desires his work – and