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Guests to the renowned gallery are familiar to unexpected experiences in its vast Turbine Hall. They have sunbathed under an artificial sun, descended down spiral slides, and seen robotic sea creatures floating through the air. However this marks the first time they will be engaging themselves in the intricate nose passages of a reindeer. The current creative installation for this huge space—developed by Indigenous Sámi creator Máret Ánne Sara—encourages patrons into a winding structure inspired by the expanded inside of a reindeer's nose airways. Upon entering, they can meander around or chill out on pelts, tuning in on earphones to tribal seniors sharing tales and knowledge.

Why the Nose?

What's the focus on the nose? It might sound playful, but the installation celebrates a rarely recognized scientific wonder: experts have discovered that in under a second, the reindeer's nose can raise the temperature of the incoming air it inhales by 80 degrees celsius, allowing the animal to endure in harsh Arctic conditions. Expanding the nose to human-scale dimensions, Sara says, "generates a feeling of inferiority that you as a individual are not superior over nature." The artist is a ex- writer, writer for kids, and environmental activist, who hails from a pastoral family in the Norwegian Arctic. "Possibly that creates the chance to shift your viewpoint or trigger some humbleness," she adds.

A Celebration to Indigenous Heritage

The maze-like design is one of several elements in Sara's absorbing art project celebrating the heritage, science, and philosophy of the Sámi, Europe's only Indigenous people. Traditionally mobile, the Sámi count roughly 100,000 people ranged across the Norwegian north, Finland, the Swedish Lapland, and the Russian Arctic (an territory they call Sápmi). They've endured discrimination, integration policies, and eradication of their dialect by all four nations. By focusing on the reindeer, an creature at the core of the Sámi cosmology and origin tale, the art also spotlights the people's issues relating to the environmental emergency, property rights, and colonialism.

Symbolism in Materials

On the lengthy entrance ramp, there's a soaring, 26-metre structure of pelts trapped by electrical wires. It represents a analogy for the societal frameworks constraining the Sámi. Like an electrical tower, part spiritual ascent, this part of the installation, named Goavve-, refers to the Sámi word for an harsh environmental condition, in which dense coatings of ice develop as changing weather thaw and refreeze the snow, encasing the reindeers' main winter food, fungus. This phenomenon is a result of climate change, which is taking place up to at an accelerated rate in the Far North than in other regions.

Previously, I traveled to see Sara in the Norwegian far north during a goavvi winter and joined Sámi herders on their Arctic vehicles in chilly conditions as they transported trailers of supplementary feed on to the barren frozen landscape to dispense manually. The herd gathered round us, scratching the icy ground in vain attempts for mossy pieces. This resource-intensive and labour-intensive method is having a drastic effect on reindeer husbandry—and on the animals' natural survival. But the other option is death. As these icy periods become commonplace, reindeer are succumbing—a number from hunger, others submerging after falling into lakes and rivers through unstable frozen surfaces. To some extent, the installation is a tribute to them. "With the layering of materials, in a way I'm introducing the phenomenon to London," says Sara.

Opposing Worldviews

This artwork also underscores the stark divergence between the industrial view of energy as a resource to be utilized for profit and survival and the Sámi philosophy of vitality as an inherent life force in creatures, individuals, and the environment. This venue's past as a fossil fuel plant is connected to this, as is what the Sámi consider green colonialism by regional governments. While attempting to be standard bearers for sustainable power, Scandinavian countries have disagreed with the Sámi over the construction of wind energy projects, river barriers, and extraction sites on their ancestral land; the Sámi argue their fundamental freedoms, ways of life, and culture are threatened. "It's hard being such a tiny group to protect your rights when the arguments are rooted in environmental protection," Sara comments. "Extractivism has adopted the discourse of environmentalism, but still it's just attempting to find better ways to continue practices of expenditure."

Family Challenges

She and her kin have personally conflicted with the Norwegian government over its tightening policies on herding. Previously, Sara's brother embarked on a sequence of finally failed court actions over the forced culling of his animals, supposedly to stop excessive feeding. To back him, Sara produced a extended series of artworks called Pile O'Sápmi including a massive curtain of numerous cranial remains, which was exhibited at the the event Documenta 14 and later acquired by the National Museum of Oslo, where it resides in the entryway.

Creative Expression as Advocacy

For many Sámi, creative work is the only domain in which they can be heard by people of other nations. In 2022, Sara was {one of three|among a group of|