Funeral for Nature
On Saturday 20th April 2024 a mock-funeral procession wended through Bath . A funeral for nature, to raise awareness: we are one of the most nature-depleted countries in the world.
Four hundred Red Rebels (redrebelbrigade.com) accompanied by drummers and mourners walked behind a willow bier holding an Earth goddess lying on a bed of mosses and ferns. The bier was carried by pallbearers dressed in green.
The procession left New King Street and headed up through Queens Square to the Circus. Then it came back through Gay Street and George Street to Milsom Street, eventually reaching the Abbey.
Throughout its journey, the crowds lining the streets were silent or spoke in whispers. Like me, many people felt deeply emotional. At the Abbey, Chris Packham, nature campaigner and conservationist, and Megan McCubbin, wildlife TV presenter, addressed the crowd.
It was quite a day.
Rob Delius is an architect and Head of Sustainability at Stride Treglown (architectural practice stridetreglown.com/contact/bath/) in Bath. I interviewed Rob a couple of years ago for the very first article on this website, Therapeutic Cities . Here he describes why and how the Funeral for Nature came about.
Rob’s story
There's been so much focus on climate in recent years, but I feel there hasn’t been enough concern about the decline of nature. Last year the State of Nature Report (stateofnature.org.uk) was published. It basically says that the UK is one of the most nature depleted countries in the world. I don't think that message has got through to many people. This event was designed to raise awareness of the shocking amount of loss and how we can begin to reverse the damage.
A lot of people have become protest-fatigued. I joined a protest march in Bath towards the end of last year. It was a whole bunch of people, lots of banners and flags saying different things. Lots of noise. All a bit chaotic. In terms of a strong message getting through, I'm not sure it was very successful. But right at the back of that march was a group of Red Rebels. Ten of them. Out of the thousand+ people marching, these ten were the ones that everyone took notice of, because they were so striking in their outfits. I thought why not do something which is built around them, and not just a few of them? Make it so powerful and impressive that people would have to take notice.
The Red Rebels have a beautiful, quiet presence. They don't say anything. They have very calm movements and poses. It’s really powerful. I imagined that if we could get lots of them together and make it all about nature, configured as a funeral procession, then people would stop, look and listen. They would take pictures of it. They would take videos of it. They would want to share it with their friends, their families, put it on social media. Creating a piece of performance rather than a piece of protest, should take the message much further. In fact it has already spread, as there have been Funerals for Nature in Gothenburg, Boston, Sydney and Lisbon - inspired by our event.
I'd never joined any of the Extinction Rebellion (xrbath.org.uk) meetings, but I went along to one of them and pitched the idea. They really liked it. We got in touch with Doug Francisco, the founder of the Red Rebels, and we all began working together. We also worked with Dan Pearson, landscape designer (danpearsonstudio.com), who designed the bier, and with Anna Gillespie, a renowned local artist (annagillespie.co.uk), who created the goddess figure. It was really beautiful.
Extinction Rebellion are an amazing group of people: so organised and so supportive. The Bath group were completely on top of this - taking registrations, coordinating accommodation for people coming from Belgium and the Netherlands and from all over the UK.
We didn't want to clutter up the procession with lots of signs and banners which would distract from the performance. So, we handed out ‘Orders of Service’ in keeping with the funeral theme. People walking alongside the procession handed out little booklets summarising what's on the website (coderedfornature.uk) – a few facts and figures about the state of nature in the UK and, importantly, a message of hope – what individuals can do, what things make a difference.
Of all the problems in the world, this is one area where individuals do have agency. On the website there is a page called ‘make change happen’ summarising what we think people can do. There are also videos and other material to inspire people.
The procession moving along George St
Why protest in this way? It's the power of art. Just repeating things, just using words, will only sink in so far. But we react in a different way to something visual, for example the sinking house in Pulteney Weir had a really big impact. People have an emotional response to something physical, that has a presence. They will remember the red procession because they felt awe and shock. That creates a much stronger connection. There is a role for the emotional response to these things and that's what we tapped into.
Staging a mock funeral may be controversial. We were being dramatic. But there are facts about the number of species declining that support the urgency. We did not say it's the end of everything. But we did say it is bad and that we need to act now. Of course, we were wary of the impact it might have on some people and on children. We didn’t want to be scary; we wanted to be inspiring.
Extracts from Chris Packham’s speech
Chris Packham and Megan McCubbin in the procession
‘We, an alleged nation of animal lovers, live in one of the most nature depleted countries in the world. I was inspired by ladybirds and tadpoles in a tiny back garden in Southampton in 1963. I never thought that in my lifetime I would need to campaign to protect those very simple things among us. But those simple things have begun to disappear. We've destroyed them and we've destroyed their habitats.
That's the tragedy that's brought us dressed in black to the streets of Bath this afternoon.
Now, as a pragmatic biologist, I can tell you that whatever we do to this planet, life will continue to prosper. Many of you will know, of course, that 65,000,000 years ago a relatively large asteroid crashed into the planet and put an end to the dinosaurs. If we extinguish ourselves and we extinguish most other life on this planet, it will bounce back and it will be just as diverse and perhaps even more beautiful than the life that we've had. But we are not presiding over a vast extinction event precipitated by external forces. We are presiding over a vast extermination event that we are perpetrating. As the most adaptable, creative, imaginative, intelligent species that has yet appeared on this planet, do we really want it on our conscience that we destroy life on Earth? That we destroy human life on Earth as well?
All is not lost. It's damaged but not lost, because whilst we've charted the declines of these species and their disappearances, we, the conservation movement, the NGO's, the RSPB, the Wildlife Trust, Natural England, all of those people, the scientists, the volunteers, the naturalists are out there doing what they've needed to do. They have put together a folio of means which can restore, repair, recover and reintroduce.
We can make a difference. We can make a difference. They haven't made a difference. You cannot rely upon them. That's why we're here, because we've had that portfolio of means, but they've not rolled them out broadly enough. They've not rolled them out rapidly enough. It's down to us to make that difference and every single one of you has the capacity to do so. There's no point in sitting back and thinking, ‘oh, I can't do anything. The problem is too big. I'm just a drop in the ocean.’ But what is an ocean but a multitude of drops? And what could bring you more pleasure than taking some small step and seeing a positive result?
At this point in time we've got to do more than we've ever done because we are fighting for our survival and our survival depends on nature. Because we are part of it. This is where we really need to stand up. That's me. That's you. We have to stand up. Because if you sit down and wait for they and them, it's not going to happen. It's what we need to do for our wildlife and our life.’
Red Rebel Brigade
Red Rebel Brigade was devised by Doug Francisco and Justine Squire, from Bristol’s Invisible Circus, for the Extinction Rebellion Spring uprising April 2019 in London. Since then groups of them have taken appeared at protests in the UK and abroad. The Funeral for Nature is believed to be the biggest gathering of Rebels so far.
It is street theatre. They wear long flowing red robes and headresses. Their faces are masked by white makeup. They move slowly, in unison. They do not speak. They do not react. They do not show any expression, except perhaps a remote sadness.
Why is it so effective? The performance is a protest but it isn’t aggressive or violent. It is beautiful. Their ‘masks’ and costumes conceal their identities so they can come together to create an illusion. They could be visitors from another dimension in time or space. The colour red symbolises blood and life. They may be disruptive but they are gentle, without aggression or violence or noise. They are grief personified.
April 2024
(The original interview with Rob took place in March before the event. It has now been amended to describe what happened.)