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Visitors to the renowned gallery are accustomed to unusual experiences in its spacious Turbine Hall. They've basked under an simulated sun, slid down spiral slides, and seen robotic jellyfish floating through the air. Yet this marks the first time they will be immersing themselves in the intricate nose cavities of a reindeer. The latest artistic project for this huge space—designed by Indigenous Sámi artist Máret Ánne Sara—invites visitors into a winding construction inspired by the expanded interior of a reindeer's nose passages. Once inside, they can wander around or relax on skins, tuning in on headphones to Sámi elders imparting stories and wisdom.

Focus on the Nasal Passages

What's the focus on the nose? It might appear quirky, but the installation pays tribute to a little-known natural marvel: scientists have discovered that in a fraction of a second, the reindeer's nose can raise the temperature of the incoming air it breathes in by 80°C, enabling the creature to thrive in harsh Arctic conditions. Scaling the nose to larger than human size, Sara says, "generates a sense of insignificance that you as a person are not in control over nature." The artist is a former journalist, children's author, and environmental activist, who is from a reindeer-herding family in the Norwegian Arctic. "Maybe that fosters the potential to change your perspective or spark some humility," she adds.

A Celebration to Traditional Ways

The maze-like structure is among various elements in Sara's absorbing exhibition celebrating the traditions, knowledge, and worldview of the Sámi, the continent's original inhabitants. Partially migratory, the Sámi number roughly 100,000 people distributed across northern Norway, the Finnish Arctic, Sweden, and Russia's Kola Peninsula (an territory they call Sápmi). They've endured persecution, cultural suppression, and suppression of their dialect by all four states. By focusing on the reindeer, an animal at the core of the Sámi mythology and creation story, the installation also spotlights the people's issues relating to the global warming, loss of territory, and external control.

Metaphor in Materials

At the extended access slope, there's a soaring, 26-metre sculpture of skins trapped by power and light cables. It can be read as a symbol for the governance and financial structures limiting the Sámi. Like an electrical tower, part celestial ladder, this section of the artwork, called Goavve-, relates to the Sámi word for an harsh environmental condition, in which thick layers of ice appear as fluctuating weather thaw and ice over the snow, locking in the reindeers' main winter sustenance, lichen. Goavvi is a consequence of climate change, which is occurring up to much more rapidly in the Far North than in other regions.

Three years ago, I traveled to see Sara in Guovdageaidnu during a goavvi winter and went with Sámi herders on their Arctic vehicles in chilly conditions as they carried containers of animal nutrition on to the barren tundra to dispense by hand. These animals surrounded round us, pawing the icy ground in vain for mossy bits. This resource-intensive and laborious procedure is having a significant impact on reindeer husbandry—and on the animals' self-sufficiency. Yet the choice is starvation. When such conditions become frequent, reindeer are succumbing—some from starvation, others suffocating after sinking in streams through thinning ice sheets. To some extent, the art is a tribute to them. "Through the stacking of materials, in a way I'm bringing the goavvi to London," says Sara.

Diverging Worldviews

The installation also underscores the stark contrast between the western understanding of power as a commodity to be utilized for economic benefit and livelihood and the Sámi worldview of life force as an innate essence in animals, individuals, and the environment. Tate Modern's history as a coal and oil power station is linked with this, as is what the Sámi view as green colonialism by regional governments. As they strive to be standard bearers for clean sources, Scandinavian countries have locked horns with the Sámi over the building of windfarms, river barriers, and mines on their ancestral land; the Sámi assert their legal protections, incomes, and culture are at risk. "It's hard being such a small minority to protect your rights when the reasons are rooted in global sustainability," Sara notes. "Mining practices has adopted the discourse of ecology, but nonetheless it's just attempting to find alternative ways to continue patterns of use."

Individual Conflicts

She and her family have themselves disagreed with the Norwegian government over its increasingly stringent regulations on herding. A few years ago, Sara's brother initiated a set of finally failed court actions over the mandatory slaughter of his animals, apparently to stop vegetation depletion. To back him, Sara developed a extended collection of creations called Pile O'Sápmi including a massive drape of numerous cranial remains, which was exhibited at the 2017's art exhibition Documenta 14 and later obtained by the public gallery, where it is displayed in the entryway.

Creative Expression as Advocacy

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