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In 2015, creative and campaigner Gustav Metzger initiated one of his last important works. Famed for introducing self-destructive creations, Metzger had dedicated his life to responding to global challenges from peace activism to vegetarianism. Via a concise video message, he issued a call for a global day of action to celebrate the natural world.

“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 makers and thinkers to stand against the continuing disappearance of flora and fauna. “Our responsibility is to make audiences aware of the diversity and intricacy in nature … and by doing so the arts will venture into territories that are fundamentally innovative.”

The Birth of Environmental Reflection

And so the environmental art day was born, a day when cultural practitioners throughout Britain developed works to the escalating planetary emergency. One of the curators, who supported Metzger in his final years, notes his sense of urgency. “I sensed a profound sense of urgency for him at the final chapter,” she says. “I just said – we must act now. We shouldn’t hold back for financial support or for anyone to approve this. Let’s just do it.”

A Decade Later

A decade on, the initiative may not have triggered the broad uprising across the arts that Metzger had hoped for, but supporters think its impact can still be observed in initiatives like artist-led declarations and environmental protests, as well as in how creatives consider the environmental impact of their methods. This is the reason she is relaunching it to commemorate its 10-year anniversary. Included in the 18 lead artists participating now are Yu-Chen Wang and Anya Gallaccio. They have all designed posters, shared messages, and developed pieces set to be revealed on November 4, 2025.

Planting Hope

Interviewing the artist, she is on site in a rural area, cultivating apple trees that will create a coiled garden. Engaging schoolchildren, her project is somewhat artistic and part learning experience. According to her, the planning and planting sessions have already involved learning about measurements (measuring out the planting intervals), genetics (exploring the hereditary traits), and origins (mapping the stories of how distinct varieties arrived in Britain).

Many of the apples were chosen because they’ve got amusing labels such as the Bloody Butcher. We have one apple that produces scarcolored sap

“A lot of the apples were selected because they’ve got amusing labels such as the other unusual varieties,” she explains. “We have one apple that releases red juice. Every one carries background narratives. The ancient variety was introduced by the Romans. The Kentish variety is the apple that dropped off a tree and struck the scientist’s head.”

The artist aimed the children to be more thoughtfully connected of the natural world and the power we have over it. “For a lot of them, apples were just things you find in a supermarket, so I was urging them, when they go shopping, to check the packaging and see the variety and their origin. Ideally it reads Kent!”

Cultural Projects Throughout Britain

At the capital, a participant’s work about extinction will engage visitors looking through Tate Modern on a journey to find the seven major glaciers that have been disappeared in the past decade. Each glacier will be illustrated on the exhibition spaces using ultraviolet markers. Whenever one is found, a alert will occur and a performance will be held to commemorate that specific ice mass.

At the same time, up in Barrow-in-Furness, an artist will be putting on a open display about our separation from nature, as well as organizing a community dinner, made using regional food. Further north, an artist is broadcasting her musical project, in which community vocalists begin a project to sing plants back to health in Newcastle’s Jesmond Dene.

Young Insights

Like Gallaccio, another participant will be engaging schoolchildren – on the actual event she is hoping to fill Cambridge’s Kettle’s Yard in youth creations that express their dreams and worries for the future. “Youthful expressions are impactful because they’re not as inhibited as grown-ups’,” she says in her recorded message. “The contributions of youth to the world is something truly special and hopefully it will provoke a feeling of duty from each person. Children are innocent. They have anxieties about what’s next. But it isn’t meant to be about fear – it should be about positivity and our responsibility that they have a tomorrow.”

Memorials and Memory

A participant’s work also resonates for children. As a former drag queen, his avian project involves sketching winged creatures and then dressing up as them – and for the initiative he is intending to tackle Liverpool’s famous Liver bird. He is also organizing a guided walk of the city, exploring locations that have been part of his Pansy Project over the past twenty years. The project commenced following he experienced several events of discrimination on a one occasion. In response, Harfleet decided to sow a flower at the site of each occurrence and document it – the project has since spiralled to incorporate experiences experienced by other people across the world. “The flowers remain there but they are temporary,” says Harfleet. “Reportedly birds consume them, so they’re a short-lived memorial.”

Harfleet chose the bloom 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 became associated with a man who is thoughtful, and that, of course, is a terrible thing,” he says.

The plan on the event day is to place blooms at additional sites and also renew the tributes in places he has marked earlier, all the while discussing with those on the itinerant journey about the events and his recollections. “We’ve seen quite a few after my previous work,” he says sadly.

Moving Forward with Hope

Harfleet hopes his work – and