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Visitors to the renowned gallery are accustomed to unexpected displays in its expansive Turbine Hall. They have relaxed under an artificial sun, slid down spiral slides, and witnessed robotic sea creatures hovering through the air. But this marks the first time they will be immersing themselves in the complex nasal cavities of a reindeer. The newest creative installation for this huge space—developed by Native Sámi artist Máret Ánne Sara—encourages patrons into a maze-like construction inspired by the enlarged inside of a reindeer's nasal cavities. Upon entering, they can meander around or unwind on reindeer hides, listening on headphones to Sámi elders sharing tales and knowledge.

Focus on the Nasal Passages

Why choose the nasal structure? It could appear playful, but the installation pays tribute to a rarely recognized biological feat: scientists have discovered that in a fraction of a second, the reindeer's nose can raise the temperature of the ambient air it breathes in by 80°C, allowing the animal to endure in harsh Arctic climates. Expanding the nose to human-scale dimensions, Sara explains, "produces a sense of inferiority that you as a individual are not in control over nature." The artist is a former reporter, children's author, and rights advocate, who hails from a herding family in the Norwegian Arctic. "Possibly that creates the potential to change your viewpoint or evoke some modesty," she states.

An Homage to Traditional Ways

The labyrinthine structure is one of several components in Sara's engaging commission celebrating the heritage, science, and beliefs of the Sámi, the continent's original inhabitants. Semi-nomadic, the Sámi count approximately 100,000 people spread across northern Norway, the Finnish Arctic, Sweden, and the Russian Arctic (an territory they call Sápmi). They've experienced persecution, integration policies, and suppression of their tongue by all four countries. With an emphasis on the reindeer, an creature at the core of the Sámi mythology and founding narrative, the art also draws attention to the people's issues relating to the environmental emergency, property rights, and external control.

Metaphor in Components

On the extended entry ramp, there's a towering, 26-metre sculpture of reindeer hides trapped by electrical wires. It can be read as a symbol for the societal frameworks restricting the Sámi. Partly a utility pole, part celestial ladder, this component of the installation, titled Goavve-, relates to the Sámi word for an severe climatic event, whereby thick layers of ice form as varying temperatures liquefy and refreeze the snow, encasing the reindeers' primary cold-season sustenance, fungus. This phenomenon is a consequence of climate change, which is happening up to much more rapidly in the Far North than globally.

Three years ago, I traveled to see Sara in Guovdageaidnu during a severe cold period and went with Sámi reindeer keepers on their Arctic vehicles in freezing temperatures as they carried trailers of food pellets on to the barren tundra to distribute manually. The reindeer crowded round us, digging the slippery ground in vain attempts for vegetative bits. This costly and laborious procedure is having a severe effect on animal rearing—and on the animals' independence. Yet the alternative is malnutrition. When such conditions become routine, reindeer are succumbing—a number from hunger, others submerging after sinking in water bodies through unstable frozen surfaces. In a sense, the art is a monument to them. "Through the stacking of components, in a way I'm bringing the condition to London," says Sara.

Diverging Belief Systems

The sculpture also underscores the clear contrast between the modern interpretation of electricity as a resource to be exploited for economic benefit and survival and the Sámi philosophy of life force as an inherent life force in creatures, humans, and land. This venue's history as a fossil fuel plant is connected to this, as is what the Sámi view as environmental exploitation by Scandinavian states. As they strive to be exemplars for clean sources, Nordic nations have locked horns with the Sámi over the development of wind energy projects, water power facilities, and extraction sites on their native soil; the Sámi contend their legal protections, incomes, and culture are threatened. "It's very difficult being such a small minority to defend yourself when the arguments are grounded in environmental protection," Sara observes. "Extractivism has appropriated the rhetoric of environmentalism, but still it's just striving to find alternative ways to continue patterns of expenditure."

Individual Conflicts

Sara and her kin have themselves disagreed with the national administration over its tightening regulations on reindeer management. Previously, Sara's brother embarked on a series of unsuccessful court actions over the mandatory slaughter of his herd, apparently to stop excessive feeding. To back him, Sara developed a extended series of creations named Pile O'Sápmi including a colossal screen of four hundred reindeer skulls, which was displayed at the 2017's art exhibition Documenta 14 and later acquired by the national institution, where it hangs in the entrance.

Creative Expression as Advocacy

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