🔗 Share this article

Back in 2015, visionary and advocate Gustav Metzger launched one of his final important works. Recognized for introducing art that erases itself, Metzger had devoted his career to responding to global challenges from peace activism to ethical eating. In a brief video message, he made a plea for a international event to remember nature.

“I, Gustav Metzger, am asking for your participation in this global appeal for a day of action to remember nature on November 4th, 2015,” he stated, urging makers and thinkers to resist the continuing disappearance of species. “Our responsibility is to remind people of the abundance and sophistication in nature … and by doing so creativity will explore realms that are naturally imaginative.”

The Birth of Remember Nature

Thus Remember Nature was established, a day when creatives nationwide created responses to the unfolding climate catastrophe. An organizer, who cared for Metzger in his final years, remembers his drive for action. “There was a profound sense of urgency for him at the final chapter,” she says. “I just said – don’t delay. We shouldn’t hold back for sponsorship or for anyone to approve this. We should proceed.”

After Ten Years

Ten years later, Remember Nature did not incited the mass movement across the arts that Metzger had dreamed of, but organizers feel its influence can still be felt in movements like artist-led declarations and environmental protests, as well as in how creatives consider the environmental impact of their practices. For this purpose she is restaging it to commemorate its decade milestone. Included in the featured creators participating now are Yu-Chen Wang and other notable figures. They have all designed posters, recorded calls to action, and developed pieces set to be revealed on November 4, 2025.

Cultivating Awareness

When speaking to the artist, she is on site in the countryside, assisting with planting apple trees that will develop into a coiled garden. Engaging schoolchildren, her project is somewhat artistic and part learning experience. She describes, the planning and planting sessions have already incorporated learning about maths (calculating the planting intervals), genetics (studying the hereditary traits), and history (mapping the journeys of how different apples were introduced to England).

A lot of the apples were picked because they’ve got humorous titles such as the other unusual varieties. We have one apple that produces scarcolored sap

“Several the apples were picked because they’ve got funny names such as the other unusual varieties,” says Gallaccio. “We have one apple that produces red juice. Every one carries stories behind them. The historical cultivar was imported by the Romans. The Flower of Kent is the apple that fell from a tree and landed on Isaac Newton’s head.”

She hoped the children to be more actively aware of nature and the control 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 check the packaging and see their names and where they were grown. Perhaps it indicates Kent!”

Creative Initiatives Across the Country

Within the city, Youngsook Choi’s project on disappearance will include attendees searching Tate Modern on a quest to find the frozen formations that have been disappeared in the past decade. All formations will be drawn on the museum surfaces using ultraviolet markers. Each discovery, a bell will ring and a reading will be held to honor that specific ice mass.

At the same time, up in another location, an artist will be presenting a public show about our alienation from the environment, as well as hosting a shared meal, cooked from regional food. Over in Newcastle, an artist is broadcasting her Some Kind of Love / Forest Choir, in which local singers undertake a task to perform for vegetation in Newcastle’s Jesmond Dene.

Children’s Voices

Like Gallaccio, a featured creator will be engaging schoolchildren – on the scheduled date she is planning to decorate an art space in youth creations that document their dreams and worries for the years ahead. “Children’s words and images are impactful because they’re not as restricted as mature perspectives,” she says in her call to action video. “What children have to offer to the world is something truly special and hopefully it will stimulate a sense of responsibility from us all. Kids are unbiased. They have concerns for tomorrow. But it isn’t meant to be about worry – it should be about hope and making sure that they see a better world.”

Memorials and Memory

A participant’s work also resonates for children. Drawing on past experience, his avian project involves drawing birds and then performing as birds – and for Remember Nature day he is intending to represent an iconic figure. He is also staging a itinerant journey of the city, stopping at places that have been part of his Pansy Project over the recent decades. This endeavor commenced following he endured multiple occurrences of prejudice on a single day. As a reaction, Harfleet decided to sow a flower at the site of each occurrence and photograph it – the project has since expanded to include incidents reported by other people across the world. “The flowers remain there but they don’t often last,” says Harfleet. “It seems wildlife enjoys them, so they’re a ephemeral memorial.”

He picked the pansy not just for the obvious reason – it has long been a derogatory label – 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 terrible thing,” he says.

The plan on the event day is to place blooms at new locations and also refresh the memorials in places he has marked earlier, all the while talking to those on the itinerant journey about the events and his recollections. “I’ve recorded quite a few since I last planted,” he says mournfully.

Progressing Optimistically

The artist wishes his work – and