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Attendees to the renowned gallery are accustomed to unexpected experiences in its expansive Turbine Hall. They have relaxed under an artificial sun, slid down spiral slides, and observed automated sea creatures floating through the air. Yet this marks the first time they will be venturing themselves in the detailed nose chambers of a reindeer. The newest creative installation for this immense space—designed by Native Sámi creator Máret Ánne Sara—invites gallerygoers into a labyrinthine structure modeled after the expanded inside of a reindeer's nasal passages. Upon entering, they can wander around or relax on skins, listening on headphones to Sámi elders telling tales and insights.

Why the Nose?

Why the nose? It may appear playful, but the installation pays tribute to a rarely recognized scientific wonder: scientists have uncovered that in a fraction of a second, the reindeer's nose can heat the incoming air it breathes in by 80 degrees celsius, helping the creature to thrive in harsh Arctic climates. Enlarging the nose to bigger than a person, Sara says, "produces a feeling of inferiority that you as a human being are not superior over nature." The artist is a former writer, writer for kids, and environmental activist, who is from a pastoral family in northern Norway. "Possibly that fosters the possibility to shift your perspective or spark some humility," she adds.

A Tribute to Sámi Culture

The maze-like installation is among various elements in Sara's absorbing commission celebrating the culture, knowledge, and philosophy of the Sámi, the sole native group in Europe. Partially migratory, the Sámi total approximately 100,000 people spread across the Norwegian north, the Finnish Arctic, Sweden, and Russia's Kola Peninsula (an territory they call Sápmi). They've endured persecution, cultural suppression, and repression of their dialect by all four states. With an emphasis on the reindeer, an creature at the heart of the Sámi cosmology and origin tale, the installation also draws attention to the group's issues connected to the climate crisis, property rights, and colonialism.

Symbolism in Materials

Along the extended entrance incline, there's a looming, 26-metre structure of skins ensnared by electrical wires. It can be read as a metaphor for the political and economic systems constraining the Sámi. Like an electrical tower, part spiritual ascent, this part of the installation, called Goavve-, refers to the Sámi name for an harsh environmental condition, in which dense sheets of ice appear as fluctuating temperatures liquefy and ice over the snow, trapping the reindeers' primary winter nourishment, lichen. This phenomenon is a outcome of planetary warming, which is taking place up to four times faster in the Far North than elsewhere.

A few years back, I met with Sara in the Norwegian far north during a severe cold period and joined Sámi reindeer keepers on their snowmobiles in freezing temperatures as they hauled trailers of supplementary feed on to the wind-scoured tundra to distribute manually. The herd gathered round us, digging the slippery ground in vain attempts for vegetative pieces. This costly and laborious process is having a drastic impact on animal rearing—and on the animals' natural survival. But the alternative is starvation. As these icy periods become frequent, reindeer are dying—some from hunger, others drowning after sinking in lakes and rivers through thinning ice sheets. In a sense, the art is a memorial to them. "Through the stacking of materials, in a way I'm bringing the phenomenon to London," says Sara.

Diverging Belief Systems

The installation also emphasizes the sharp difference between the modern view of power as a asset to be harnessed for profit and existence and the Sámi philosophy of vitality as an inherent life force in animals, people, and land. This venue's legacy as a fossil fuel plant is connected to this, as is what the Sámi consider eco-imperialism by Scandinavian states. In their efforts to be leaders for clean sources, Nordic nations have clashed with the Sámi over the building of turbine fields, hydroelectric dams, and digging operations on their traditional territory; the Sámi argue their human rights, incomes, and traditions are endangered. "It's hard being such a small minority to defend yourself when the justifications are based on saving the world," Sara comments. "Resource exploitation has appropriated the discourse of sustainability, but yet it's just striving to find more suitable ways to maintain patterns of use."

Personal Challenges

She and her kin have themselves disagreed with the national administration over its increasingly stringent policies on reindeer management. In 2016, Sara's sibling undertook a series of ultimately unsuccessful court actions over the required reduction of his livestock, ostensibly to stop excessive feeding. To back him, Sara developed a multi-year set of creations named Pile O'Sápmi featuring a massive screen of 400 cranial remains, which was shown at the the art exhibition Documenta 14 and later purchased by the national institution, where it hangs in the lobby.

Art as Advocacy

For numerous Indigenous people, visual expression is the only domain in which they can be understood by people of other nations. In 2022, Sara was {one of three|among a group of|