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During 2015, artist and activist Gustav Metzger initiated one of his ultimate major projects. Known for pioneering art that erases itself, Metzger had devoted his career to addressing global challenges from peace activism to vegetarianism. Via a concise video message, he issued a call for a international event to honor the environment.

“I, Gustav Metzger, am asking for your involvement in this international summons for a day of action to commemorate our planet on November 4th, 2015,” he stated, encouraging artists and creatives to stand against the ongoing loss of species. “Our task is to make audiences aware of the richness and complexity in nature … and by doing so art will enter domains that are naturally imaginative.”

The Creation of Environmental Reflection

Thus the environmental art day came into being, a day when artists across the country created responses to the escalating planetary emergency. One of the curators, who supported Metzger in his later life, remembers his drive for action. “He had a profound sense of urgency for him at the close of his days,” she says. “I urged him – let’s not mess around. No need to pause for sponsorship or for anyone to approve this. We should proceed.”

Ten Years On

After ten years, the initiative may not have sparked the widespread change across the arts that Metzger had hoped for, but organizers feel its influence can still be seen in campaigns like Culture Declares and Extinction Rebellion, as well as in how creatives consider the sustainability of their practices. That’s why she is restaging it to commemorate its ten-year mark. Part of the featured creators participating now are Cornelia Parker and other notable figures. They have all designed posters, shared messages, and produced installations set to be presented on the fourth of November next year.

Cultivating Awareness

Interviewing one participant, she is working outdoors in the countryside, cultivating apple trees that will create a coiled garden. Working with schoolchildren, her project is somewhat artistic and half educational workshop. According to her, the preparation and sowing sessions have already involved learning about mathematics (spacing the planting intervals), biology (exploring the apple’s DNA), and history (tracing the backgrounds of how various cultivars were introduced to England).

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

“Many of the apples were picked because they’ve got amusing labels such as the other unusual varieties,” she explains. “We have one apple that produces crimson liquid. Each has histories attached. The ancient variety was introduced by the Romans. The local breed is the apple that dropped off a tree and hit the physicist’s head.”

Gallaccio wanted the children to be more actively aware of nature and the influence we have over it. “In their experience, apples were just things you find in a supermarket, so I was urging them, on their next shopping trip, to read the label and see the variety and their origin. Perhaps it indicates Kent!”

Artistic Responses Nationwide

At the capital, one artist’s Book of Loss will involve participants searching an art institution on a quest to find the seven major glaciers that have been disappeared in modern times. All formations will be depicted on the museum surfaces using ultraviolet markers. Whenever one is found, a alert will occur and a reading will be performed to commemorate that individual formation.

Meanwhile, up in a northern town, Maddi Nicholson will be presenting a open display about our separation from nature, as well as organizing a shared meal, made using regional food. Further north, a participant is streaming her environmental performance, in which local singers undertake a task to sing plants back to health in a local park.

Children’s Voices

Following this approach, another participant will be engaging schoolchildren – on the actual event she is hoping to fill Cambridge’s Kettle’s Yard in kids’ letters and drawings that capture their hopes and fears for the future. “Children’s words and images are powerful because they’re not as inhibited as adults’,” she says in her call to action video. “What children have to offer to the world is something truly special and perhaps it can stimulate a awareness of obligation from everyone. Youth is pure. They have concerns for tomorrow. But this shouldn’t be about fear – it should be about hope and making sure that they have a tomorrow.”

Tributes and Thoughts

Another artist’s work also connects with children. With a background in performance, his feathered initiative involves illustrating avians and then dressing up as them – and for the initiative he is intending to tackle an iconic figure. He is also staging a walking tour of the city, stopping at places that have been part of his Pansy Project over the recent decades. That ongoing series began when he endured multiple occurrences of prejudice on a one occasion. As a reaction, Harfleet decided to place a bloom at the spot where it happened and photograph it – the project has since grown to cover events reported by other people across the world. “I place the plants there but they don’t often last,” says Harfleet. “It seems birds consume them, so they’re a ephemeral memorial.”

Harfleet chose the flower not just for the clear connection – 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 project on the event day is to sow flowers at new locations and also refresh the memorials in places he has previously memorialised, all the while conversing with those on the itinerant journey about the incidents and his recollections. “There’s been quite a few following earlier installations,” he says with regret.

Progressing Optimistically

Harfleet hopes his work – and