Artists Fight Back Against the Planetary Crisis: Planting the Apple That Dropped on Isaac Newton's Head

Back in 2015, artist and activist Gustav Metzger launched one of his last significant endeavors. Famed for creating auto-destructive art, Metzger had spent a lifetime to responding to global challenges from nuclear disarmament to plant-based living. Through a short video message, he made a plea for a international event to remember nature.

“I call upon you for your involvement in this global appeal for a day of action to reflect on the environment on the fourth of November, 2015,” he declared, urging makers and thinkers to stand against the ongoing loss of living beings. “The mission is to make audiences aware of the diversity and intricacy in nature … and by doing so art will enter territories that are inherently creative.”

The Birth of Nature Remembrance

And so the environmental art day was established, a day when cultural practitioners throughout Britain produced pieces to the ongoing environmental crisis. Jo Joelson, who worked closely with Metzger in his last days, recalls his feeling of immediacy. “There was a strong sense of urgency for him at the end of his life,” she says. “I just said – let’s not mess around. No need to pause for sponsorship or for anyone to approve this. Let’s just do it.”

Ten Years On

Ten years later, Remember Nature did not incited the mass movement across the arts that Metzger had dreamed of, but organizers feel its legacy can still be felt in campaigns like Culture Declares and Extinction Rebellion, as well as in how creatives consider the eco-friendliness of their practices. This is the reason she is relaunching it to mark its 10-year anniversary. Part of the key participants involved this time are A Man Called Adam and other notable figures. They have all designed posters, made video appeals, and produced installations set to be presented on November 4, 2025.

Cultivating Awareness

In conversation with the artist, she is on site in a rural area, helping plant apple trees that will grow to form a spiral-shaped orchard. Collaborating with schoolchildren, her project is somewhat artistic and half educational workshop. She describes, the preparation and sowing sessions have already incorporated learning about mathematics (calculating the gaps in the orchard), genetics (discussing the genetic makeup), and geography (tracing the stories of how distinct varieties were introduced to England).

Many of the apples were chosen because they’ve got amusing labels such as the other unusual varieties. We have one apple that releases scarcolored sap

“A lot of the apples were picked because they’ve got humorous titles such as the other unusual varieties,” she explains. “We have one apple that ‘bleeds’ crimson liquid. Each has stories behind them. The historical cultivar was introduced by the Romans. The local breed is the apple that descended from a tree and struck Isaac Newton’s head.”

The artist aimed the children to be more thoughtfully connected of the environment and the power we have over it. “For a lot of them, apples were just things you get at a supermarket, so I was prompting them, when they go shopping, to check the packaging and see what they’re called and where they were grown. Hopefully it says Kent!”

Creative Initiatives Throughout Britain

In London, Youngsook Choi’s Book of Loss will engage visitors searching an art institution on a quest to find the ice masses that have been vanished in the past decade. All formations will be illustrated on the museum surfaces using invisible ink. Each discovery, a alert will occur and a reading will be performed to honor that particular glacier.

Meanwhile, up in another location, an artist will be presenting a open display about our separation from nature, as well as hosting a communal feast, made using organic, local produce. Further north, an artist is streaming her environmental performance, in which local singers undertake a task to sing plants back to health in a local park.

Youth Perspectives

Like Gallaccio, another participant will be engaging schoolchildren – on the scheduled date she is hoping to cover Cambridge’s Kettle’s Yard in youth creations that document their dreams and worries for the years ahead. “Children’s words and images are compelling because they’re not as restricted as mature perspectives,” she says in her public appeal. “The contributions of youth to the world is something quite unique and hopefully it will stimulate a awareness of obligation from everyone. Kids are unbiased. They have anxieties about what’s next. But it isn’t meant to be about fear – it should be about hope and making sure that they have a tomorrow.”

Tributes and Thoughts

Paul Harfleet’s work also connects with children. Drawing on past experience, his avian project involves drawing birds and then performing as birds – and for the initiative he is intending to represent an iconic figure. He is also conducting a walking tour of the city, visiting various sites that have been part of his Pansy Project over the past twenty years. The project started after he endured multiple occurrences of homophobic abuse on a particular day. In response, Harfleet decided to plant a pansy at the location of every incident and record it – the project has since grown to cover events reported by other people across the world. “I leave the pansies there but they fade quickly,” says Harfleet. “It seems pigeons like to eat them, so they’re a ephemeral memorial.”

The artist selected the bloom not just for the direct association – it has long been a slur – but also because its origin is the French verb, penser, to think. “It was linked to a man who is reflective, and that, of course, is a negative trait,” he says.

The intention on Remember Nature day is to place blooms at fresh spots and also replant flowers in places he has previously memorialised, all the while talking to those on the itinerant journey about the incidents and his memories of them. “There’s been quite a few since I last planted,” he says mournfully.

Moving Forward with Hope

The artist wishes his work – and