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Guests to the renowned gallery are accustomed to unusual encounters in its vast Turbine Hall. They have relaxed under an man-made sun, slid down amusement rides, and witnessed AI-powered sea creatures floating through the air. Yet this marks the initial time they will be immersing themselves in the detailed nasal chambers of a reindeer. The latest creative installation for this huge space—designed by Indigenous Sámi creator Máret Ánne Sara—welcomes visitors into a labyrinthine construction based on the scaled-up interior of a reindeer's nasal airways. Upon entering, they can stroll around or chill out on skins, listening on earphones to Sámi elders sharing narratives and knowledge.

Why the Nose?

Why choose the nasal structure? It might appear whimsical, but the installation pays tribute to a little-known natural marvel: scientists have found that in under a second, the reindeer's nose can heat the incoming air it inhales by 80 degrees celsius, allowing the animal to survive in inhospitable Arctic climates. Scaling the nose to human-scale dimensions, Sara explains, "creates a feeling of insignificance that you as a human being are not in control over nature." Sara is a former journalist, writer for kids, and land defender, who comes from a pastoral family in northern Norway. "Maybe that generates the potential to shift your viewpoint or spark some modesty," she continues.

A Tribute to Indigenous Heritage

The maze-like design is among various components in Sara's immersive exhibition celebrating the culture, knowledge, and worldview of the Sámi, the sole native group in Europe. Semi-nomadic, the Sámi total roughly 100,000 people distributed across the Norwegian north, Finland, Sweden, and Russia's Kola Peninsula (an territory they call Sápmi). They've endured oppression, integration policies, and eradication of their tongue by all four countries. With an emphasis on the reindeer, an animal at the center of the Sámi belief system and founding narrative, the art also highlights the people's challenges associated with the global warming, loss of territory, and colonialism.

Meaning in Elements

On the lengthy access ramp, there's a looming, eighty-five-foot formation of pelts trapped by utility lines. It can be read as a symbol for the societal frameworks restricting the Sámi. Like an electrical tower, part spiritual ascent, this component of the exhibit, named Goavve-, points to the Sámi word for an extreme weather phenomenon, whereby solid sheets of ice appear as fluctuating temperatures thaw and refreeze the snow, encasing the reindeers' key winter sustenance, fungus. The condition is a consequence of planetary warming, which is happening up to much more rapidly in the Polar region than in other regions.

Three years ago, I traveled to see Sara in the Norwegian far north during a goavvi winter and joined Sámi reindeer keepers on their Arctic vehicles in freezing temperatures as they carried carts of supplementary feed on to the wind-scoured Arctic plains to distribute through labor. The herd crowded round us, digging the icy ground in vain for vegetative pieces. This costly and laborious process is having a significant influence on herding practices—and on the animals' independence. However the other option is death. As these icy periods become commonplace, reindeer are dying—a number from hunger, others suffocating after sinking in water bodies through prematurely melting ice. In a sense, the work is a memorial to them. "By overlapping of elements, in a way I'm introducing the phenomenon to London," says Sara.

Diverging Perspectives

This artwork also underscores the sharp difference between the modern understanding of power as a resource to be utilized for profit and survival and the Sámi outlook of vitality as an inherent power in creatures, individuals, and the environment. Tate Modern's legacy as a coal and oil power station is connected to this, as is what the Sámi see as environmental exploitation by regional governments. As they strive to be exemplars for sustainable power, Nordic nations have clashed with the Sámi over the development of windfarms, hydroelectric dams, and mines on their native soil; the Sámi assert their human rights, ways of life, and culture are threatened. "It's very difficult being such a tiny group to stand your ground when the arguments are grounded in environmental protection," Sara observes. "Extractivism has co-opted the rhetoric of sustainability, but nonetheless it's just striving to find better ways to persist in patterns of use."

Personal Challenges

The artist and her kin have personally clashed with the national administration over its tightening rules on herding. Previously, Sara's brother undertook a series of ultimately unsuccessful court actions over the forced culling of his animals, ostensibly to stop vegetation depletion. To back him, Sara developed a multi-year series of creations called Pile O'Sápmi comprising a huge curtain of 400 cranial remains, which was exhibited at the 2017 art exhibition Documenta 14 and later obtained by the National Museum of Oslo, where it resides in the entryway.

The Role of Art in Activism

Among the community, art appears the exclusive realm in which they can be listened to by the global community. In 2022, Sara was {one of three|among a group of|