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Visitors to the renowned gallery are accustomed to unexpected encounters in its spacious Turbine Hall. They have sunbathed under an artificial sun, glided down spiral slides, and observed automated jellyfish floating through the air. However this marks the inaugural time they will be venturing themselves in the intricate nose cavities of a reindeer. The newest artist commission for this cavernous space—created by Native Sámi artist Máret Ánne Sara—invites visitors into a labyrinthine construction based on the enlarged inside of a reindeer's nasal passages. Upon entering, they can wander around or relax on reindeer hides, tuning in on earphones to tribal seniors imparting narratives and insights.

The Significance of the Nose

Why the nose? It may appear whimsical, but the installation celebrates a rarely recognized natural marvel: researchers have found that in under a second, the reindeer's nose can raise the temperature of the incoming air it inhales by eighty degrees, helping the creature to endure in extreme Arctic temperatures. Scaling the nose to bigger than a person, Sara says, "creates a feeling of inferiority that you as a individual are not superior over nature." The artist is a former journalist, young adult author, and land defender, who comes from a herding family in northern Norway. "Maybe that generates the chance to shift your viewpoint or trigger some humbleness," she continues.

A Tribute to Traditional Ways

The winding structure is part of a elements in Sara's immersive exhibition honoring the traditions, knowledge, and beliefs of the Sámi, the continent's original inhabitants. Semi-nomadic, the Sámi number approximately 100,000 people distributed across northern Norway, the Finnish Arctic, the Swedish Lapland, and the Russian Arctic (an area they call Sápmi). They've endured discrimination, forced assimilation, and repression of their dialect by all four countries. With an emphasis on the reindeer, an creature at the heart of the Sámi belief system and founding narrative, the work also highlights the people's challenges connected to the environmental emergency, property rights, and imperialism.

Meaning in Components

Along the lengthy entry slope, there's a looming, eighty-five-foot formation of pelts trapped by power and light cables. It serves as a symbol for the governance and financial structures restricting the Sámi. Like an electrical tower, part spiritual ascent, this section of the artwork, named Goavve-, refers to the Sámi name for an extreme weather phenomenon, whereby dense sheets of ice develop as varying temperatures melt and ice over the snow, trapping the reindeers' main winter nourishment, lichen. This phenomenon is a outcome of climate change, which is taking place up to at an accelerated rate in the Arctic than elsewhere.

Previously, I met with Sara in the Norwegian far north during a severe cold period and accompanied Sámi herders on their Arctic vehicles in freezing temperatures as they transported carts of animal nutrition on to the exposed Arctic plains to distribute by hand. The reindeer surrounded round us, scratching the icy ground in futility for mossy pieces. This resource-intensive and labour-intensive process is having a significant effect on herding practices—and on the animals' independence. However the other option is death. As goavvi winters become routine, reindeer are dying—some from lack of food, others suffocating after plunging into lakes and rivers through thinning ice sheets. On one level, the work is a tribute to them. "With the layering of components, in a way I'm transporting the goavvi to London," says Sara.

Diverging Worldviews

The installation also highlights the stark divergence between the industrial interpretation of energy as a asset to be utilized for economic benefit and livelihood and the Sámi philosophy of life force as an inherent power in animals, people, and land. Tate Modern's past as a coal and oil power station is tied up in this, as is what the Sámi see as eco-imperialism by regional governments. In their efforts to be standard bearers for sustainable power, Nordic nations have clashed with the Sámi over the development of wind energy projects, water power facilities, and digging operations on their traditional territory; the Sámi contend their legal protections, incomes, and way of life are threatened. "It's challenging being such a small minority to stand your ground when the justifications are rooted in environmental protection," Sara notes. "Mining practices has co-opted the discourse of ecology, but still it's just attempting to find more suitable ways to maintain habits of use."

Individual Conflicts

She and her relatives have themselves conflicted with the state authorities over its tightening regulations on reindeer management. In 2016, Sara's sibling undertook a sequence of unsuccessful lawsuits over the required reduction of his animals, ostensibly to stop overgrazing. In support, Sara created a extended series of pieces named Pile O'Sápmi featuring a huge screen of 400 reindeer skulls, which was displayed at the 2017 event Documenta 14 and later purchased by the National Museum of Oslo, where it is displayed in the entrance.

The Role of Art in Advocacy

For many Sámi, creative work is the only sphere in which they can be listened to by outsiders. In 2022, Sara was {one of three|among a group of|