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Visitors to the renowned gallery are accustomed to unusual displays in its spacious Turbine Hall. They have relaxed under an man-made sun, slid down amusement rides, and observed robotic jellyfish hovering through the air. However this marks the initial time they will be immersing themselves in the complex nose passages of a reindeer. The newest creative installation for this immense space—developed by Native Sámi artist Máret Ánne Sara—invites visitors into a maze-like construction inspired by the scaled-up interior of a reindeer's nose passages. Inside, they can meander around or relax on skins, listening on headphones to community leaders imparting tales and knowledge.

Why the Nose?

Why the nose? It could sound whimsical, but the installation celebrates a little-known natural marvel: experts have uncovered that in a fraction of a second, the reindeer's nose can raise the temperature of the surrounding air it takes in by 80 degrees celsius, enabling the creature to thrive in inhospitable Arctic conditions. Scaling the nose to bigger than a person, Sara notes, "produces a feeling of smallness that you as a human being are not dominant over nature." She is a former reporter, young adult author, and rights advocate, who hails from a reindeer-herding family in the far north of Norway. "Possibly that creates the potential to change your perspective or spark some humbleness," she continues.

An Homage to Traditional Ways

The maze-like structure is one of several elements in Sara's immersive commission showcasing the traditions, understanding, and beliefs of the Sámi, the sole native group in Europe. Traditionally mobile, the Sámi number approximately 100,000 people ranged across the Norwegian north, the Finnish Arctic, Sweden, and Russia's Kola Peninsula (an area they call Sápmi). They have faced persecution, forced assimilation, and repression of their dialect by all four nations. With an emphasis on the reindeer, an animal at the core of the Sámi cosmology and origin tale, the work also highlights the group's challenges associated with the climate crisis, land dispossession, and external control.

Symbolism in Elements

Along the lengthy entry ramp, there's a towering, eighty-five-foot formation of skins entangled by electrical wires. It represents a metaphor for the societal frameworks limiting the Sámi. Part pylon, part celestial ladder, this part of the artwork, named Goavve-, refers to the Sámi name for an severe climatic event, wherein solid sheets of ice develop as fluctuating temperatures liquefy and refreeze the snow, locking in the reindeers' main cold-season food, fungus. Goavvi is a consequence of global heating, which is taking place up to much more rapidly in the Far North than globally.

Three years ago, I met with Sara in a remote town during a goavvi winter and went with Sámi pastoralists on their motorized sleds in chilly conditions as they carried containers of food pellets on to the barren tundra to dispense through labor. These animals gathered round us, pawing the frozen ground in vain attempts for lichen-covered pieces. This resource-intensive and labour-intensive procedure is having a severe effect on reindeer husbandry—and on the animals' independence. But the other option is malnutrition. When such conditions become commonplace, reindeer are dying—a number from lack of food, others submerging after falling into streams through thinning ice sheets. In a sense, the work is a monument to them. "Through the stacking of components, in a way I'm bringing the phenomenon to London," says Sara.

Diverging Worldviews

The installation also emphasizes the sharp difference between the modern interpretation of power as a resource to be harnessed for economic benefit and survival and the Sámi worldview of vitality as an innate power in creatures, humans, and the environment. The gallery's past as a fossil fuel plant is linked with this, as is what the Sámi see as environmental exploitation by Scandinavian states. In their efforts to be standard bearers for clean sources, Scandinavian countries have clashed with the Sámi over the construction of windfarms, hydroelectric dams, and mines on their ancestral land; the Sámi argue their legal protections, incomes, and culture are at risk. "It's challenging being such a limited population to stand your ground when the arguments are grounded in saving the world," Sara notes. "Mining practices has co-opted the language of ecology, but nonetheless it's just attempting to find better ways to continue patterns of expenditure."

Family Struggles

The artist and her kin have personally clashed with the Norwegian government over its ever-stricter regulations on reindeer management. A few years ago, Sara's sibling undertook a set of finally failed lawsuits over the mandatory slaughter of his livestock, apparently to stop vegetation depletion. In support, Sara created a multi-year set of artworks named Pile O'Sápmi featuring a colossal drape of numerous cranial remains, which was shown at the the show Documenta 14 and later obtained by the national institution, where it is displayed in the lobby.

Creative Expression as Advocacy

For many Sámi, visual expression seems the exclusive domain in which they can be listened to by people of other nations. Recently, Sara was {one of three|among a group of|