🔗 Share this article

Back in 2015, artist and activist Gustav Metzger launched one of his final significant endeavors. Famed for pioneering auto-destructive art, Metzger had devoted his career to addressing global challenges from peace activism to vegetarianism. In a brief video message, he made a plea for a global day of action to remember nature.

“I, Gustav Metzger, am asking for your involvement in this worldwide call for a day of action to commemorate our planet on 4 November 2015,” he announced, encouraging cultural workers to resist the steady eradication of flora and fauna. “Our task is to remind people of the diversity and intricacy in nature … and by doing so art will enter realms that are inherently creative.”

The Birth of Environmental Reflection

And so Remember Nature was born, a day when artists across the country produced pieces to the ongoing environmental crisis. One of the curators, who supported Metzger in his later life, recalls his drive for action. “There was a strong sense of urgency for him at the close of his days,” she says. “I urged him – don’t delay. No need to pause for funding or for anyone to green light this. Take action immediately.”

After Ten Years

After ten years, the initiative hasn’t quite sparked the widespread change across the arts that Metzger had hoped for, but Joelson believes its influence can still be observed in campaigns like artist-led declarations and climate activism networks, as well as in how artists approach the sustainability of their practices. That’s why she is restaging it to celebrate its decade milestone. Among the featured creators involved this time are Cornelia Parker and prominent artists. They have all created visual art, shared messages, and produced installations set to be unveiled on the fourth of November next year.

Cultivating Awareness

When speaking to one participant, she is out in a field in the countryside, cultivating apple trees that will create a spiral-shaped orchard. Collaborating with schoolchildren, her project is somewhat artistic and somewhat instructive. As she explains, the design and cultivation sessions have already included learning about maths (spacing the planting intervals), biology (exploring the hereditary traits), and origins (mapping the stories of how different apples came to the UK).

Several the apples were chosen because they’ve got funny names such as the Bloody Butcher. We have one apple that releases crimson liquid

“A lot of the apples were selected because they’ve got amusing labels such as the Bloody Butcher,” the artist notes. “We have one apple that releases crimson liquid. They all have background narratives. The decio apple was brought over by the Romans. The Flower of Kent is the apple that fell from a tree and landed on Isaac Newton’s head.”

The artist aimed the children to be more thoughtfully connected of the natural world and the influence we have over it. “In their experience, apples were just things you get at a supermarket, so I was encouraging them, on their next shopping trip, to look on the bag and see their names and the source. Ideally it reads Kent!”

Artistic Responses Throughout Britain

At the capital, Youngsook Choi’s Book of Loss will involve participants exploring a major gallery on a journey to find the seven major glaciers that have been vanished in the past decade. Every ice sheet will be depicted on the gallery’s windows and walls using ultraviolet markers. When located, a bell will ring and a performance will be held to honor that specific ice mass.

At the same time, up in Barrow-in-Furness, a creative will be putting on a open display about our separation from nature, as well as hosting a communal feast, cooked from sustainable ingredients. Further north, Uta Kögelsberger is broadcasting her Some Kind of Love / Forest Choir, in which regional performers undertake a task to sing plants back to health in a green space.

Youth Perspectives

Similar to other artists, Cornelia Parker will be collaborating with schoolchildren – on the scheduled date she is aiming to cover an art space in children’s artwork that capture their hopes and fears for the tomorrow. “Kids’ art are compelling because they’re not as inhibited as mature perspectives,” she says in her public appeal. “What children have to offer to the world is something quite unique and perhaps it can provoke a sense of responsibility from each person. Kids are unbiased. They have fears about the future. But it isn’t meant to be about fear – it should be about positivity and making sure that they have a tomorrow.”

Tributes and Thoughts

Another artist’s work also resonates for children. Drawing on past experience, his feathered initiative involves illustrating avians and then dressing up as them – and for Remember Nature day he is aiming to address a local symbol. He is also staging a walking tour of the city, visiting various sites that have been part of his Pansy Project over the recent decades. The project began when he experienced three incidents of homophobic abuse on a particular day. As a reaction, Harfleet decided to sow a flower at the site of each occurrence and record it – the project has since grown to include incidents experienced by other people across the world. “The flowers remain there but they fade quickly,” says Harfleet. “Reportedly wildlife enjoys them, so they’re a ephemeral 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 became associated with a man who is reflective, and that, of course, is a negative trait,” he says.

The plan on 4 November 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 events and his memories of them. “There’s been quite a few following earlier installations,” he says mournfully.

Progressing Optimistically

The artist wishes his work – and