🔗 Share this article

During 2015, artist and activist Gustav Metzger embarked on one of his ultimate significant endeavors. Recognized for pioneering self-destructive creations, Metzger had devoted his career to responding to global challenges from nuclear disarmament to plant-based living. Via a concise video message, he requested support for a international event to honor the environment.

“I, Gustav Metzger, am asking for your engagement in this international summons for a day of action to reflect on the environment on 4 November 2015,” he declared, inviting artists and creatives to oppose the continuing disappearance of flora and fauna. “Our responsibility is to remind people of the richness and complexity in nature … and by doing so art will enter domains that are inherently creative.”

The Creation of Environmental Reflection

And so the environmental art day was established, a day when artists across the country developed works to the unfolding climate catastrophe. One of the curators, who cared for Metzger in his later life, remembers his sense of urgency. “He had a great sense of urgency for him at the final chapter,” she says. “I urged him – we must act now. No need to pause for sponsorship or for anyone to authorize this. Let’s just do it.”

A Decade Later

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 observed in initiatives like cultural advocacy groups and climate activism networks, as well as in how creatives consider the environmental impact of their methods. This is the reason she is restaging it to celebrate its 10-year anniversary. Part of the key participants participating now are A Man Called Adam and other notable figures. All participants have produced imagery, recorded calls to action, and produced installations set to be revealed on 4 November 2025.

Planting Hope

Interviewing Anya Gallaccio, she is working outdoors in Kent, cultivating apple trees that will create a spiral-shaped orchard. Collaborating with schoolchildren, her project is half artwork and half educational workshop. She describes, the design and cultivation sessions have already included learning about mathematics (measuring out the planting intervals), genetics (discussing the hereditary traits), and history (tracing the journeys of how various cultivars arrived in Britain).

Many of the apples were selected because they’ve got humorous titles such as the Duck’s Bill. We have one apple that ‘bleeds’ scarcolored sap

“Many of the apples were picked because they’ve got humorous titles such as the Duck’s Bill,” she explains. “We have one apple that releases red juice. Every one carries histories attached. The ancient variety was introduced by the Romans. The Flower of Kent is the apple that descended from a tree and hit Isaac Newton’s head.”

The artist aimed the children to be more thoughtfully connected of the natural world and the power we have over it. “To many of them, apples were just things you get at a supermarket, so I was encouraging them, when they go shopping, to check the packaging and see what they’re called and the source. Ideally it reads Kent!”

Cultural Projects Across the Country

Within the city, one artist’s project on disappearance will engage visitors looking through Tate Modern on a quest to find the ice masses that have been lost in the past decade. Every ice sheet will be drawn on the gallery’s windows and walls using ultraviolet markers. Each discovery, a chime will sound and a recitation will be held to commemorate that particular glacier.

Meanwhile, up in Barrow-in-Furness, Maddi Nicholson will be putting on a open display about our separation from nature, as well as organizing a shared meal, made using organic, local produce. In another city, Uta Kögelsberger is sharing her environmental performance, in which community vocalists undertake a task to perform for vegetation in a green space.

Young Insights

Like Gallaccio, Cornelia Parker will be collaborating with schoolchildren – on the day itself she is hoping to cover Cambridge’s Kettle’s Yard in children’s artwork that capture their hopes and fears for the tomorrow. “Children’s words and images are impactful because they’re not as trammelled as mature perspectives,” she says in her call to action video. “Young people’s input to the world is something truly special and perhaps it can provoke a sense of responsibility from us all. Kids are unbiased. They have anxieties about what’s next. But this shouldn’t be about fear – it should be about optimism and making sure that they see a better world.”

Tributes and Thoughts

Another artist’s work also appeals to children. Drawing on past experience, his feathered initiative involves illustrating avians and then performing as birds – and for Remember Nature day he is intending to address Liverpool’s famous Liver bird. He is also staging a itinerant journey of the city, visiting various sites that have been part of his Pansy Project over the last two decades. That ongoing series started after he faced multiple occurrences of homophobic abuse on a particular day. As a reaction, Harfleet decided to plant a pansy at the location of every incident and photograph it – the project has since spiralled to cover events experienced 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 very temporary memorial.”

Harfleet chose the pansy not just for the clear connection – it has long been a derogatory label – but also because its name derives from the French verb, penser, to think. “It was linked to a man who is contemplative, and that, of course, is a negative trait,” he says.

The plan on the event day is to sow flowers at new locations and also refresh the memorials in places he has marked earlier, all the while discussing with those on the itinerant journey about the incidents and his memories of them. “I’ve recorded quite a few following earlier installations,” he says mournfully.

Moving Forward with Hope

He desires his work – and