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Guests to Tate Modern are accustomed to surprising encounters in its vast Turbine Hall. They have sunbathed under an artificial sun, descended down spiral slides, and observed robotic sea creatures drifting through the air. Yet this marks the first time they will be engaging themselves in the intricate nose cavities of a reindeer. The current artist commission for this cavernous space—created by Native Sámi creator Máret Ánne Sara—welcomes gallerygoers into a winding construction modeled after the scaled-up inside of a reindeer's nose cavities. Upon entering, they can meander around or relax on skins, listening on earphones to tribal seniors sharing narratives and knowledge.

Why the Nose?

What's the focus on the nose? It might seem quirky, but the exhibit celebrates a rarely recognized biological feat: experts have found that in less than one second, the reindeer's nose can warm the surrounding air it breathes in by 80°C, helping the animal to thrive in harsh Arctic climates. Enlarging the nose to bigger than a person, Sara explains, "creates a feeling of insignificance that you as a individual are not in control over nature." She is a ex- journalist, children's author, and land defender, who hails from a herding family in northern Norway. "Maybe that fosters the potential to change your perspective or spark some modesty," she states.

A Tribute to Traditional Ways

The maze-like structure is among various elements in Sara's absorbing exhibition celebrating the traditions, knowledge, and philosophy of the Sámi, the continent's original inhabitants. Partially migratory, the Sámi count roughly 100,000 people ranged across northern Norway, the Finnish Arctic, the Swedish Lapland, and the Russian Arctic (an territory they call Sápmi). They've endured discrimination, forced assimilation, and repression of their tongue by all four nations. By focusing on the reindeer, an animal at the heart of the Sámi mythology and origin tale, the work also spotlights the people's challenges connected to the climate crisis, land dispossession, and imperialism.

Symbolism in Elements

Along the extended entrance slope, there's a looming, 26-metre structure of reindeer hides ensnared by electrical wires. It serves as a analogy for the societal frameworks constraining the Sámi. Partly a utility pole, part celestial ladder, this part of the artwork, titled Goavve-, refers to the Sámi word for an harsh environmental condition, whereby dense layers of ice develop as varying conditions melt and refreeze the snow, encasing the reindeers' main cold-season nourishment, fungus. This phenomenon is a outcome of climate change, which is occurring up to at an accelerated rate in the Polar region than globally.

A few years back, I visited Sara in a remote town during a goavvi winter and went with Sámi pastoralists on their motorized sleds in chilly conditions as they hauled containers of supplementary feed on to the exposed tundra to dispense by hand. These animals surrounded round us, scratching the slippery ground in vain for mossy pieces. This resource-intensive and demanding method is having a drastic impact on reindeer husbandry—and on the animals' natural survival. However the alternative is malnutrition. As goavvi winters become routine, reindeer are perishing—a number from starvation, others suffocating after plunging into streams through unstable frozen surfaces. In a sense, the installation is a memorial to them. "Through the stacking of materials, in a way I'm bringing the phenomenon to London," says Sara.

Contrasting Perspectives

This artwork also highlights the stark contrast between the modern understanding of power as a commodity to be utilized for gain and survival and the Sámi outlook of life force as an inherent essence in animals, humans, and the environment. Tate Modern's legacy as a fossil fuel plant is linked with this, as is what the Sámi see as eco-imperialism by regional governments. As they strive to be standard bearers for sustainable power, Scandinavian countries have clashed with the Sámi over the construction of wind energy projects, water power facilities, and extraction sites on their traditional territory; the Sámi contend their human rights, livelihoods, and way of life are threatened. "It's challenging being such a limited population to protect your rights when the reasons are based on saving the world," Sara observes. "Resource exploitation has adopted the discourse of ecology, but yet it's just attempting to find alternative ways to maintain practices of consumption."

Individual Struggles

Sara and her kin have themselves conflicted with the Norwegian government over its ever-stricter regulations on reindeer management. Previously, Sara's sibling embarked on a sequence of finally failed lawsuits over the mandatory slaughter of his livestock, supposedly to stop overgrazing. To back him, Sara created a multi-year collection of creations titled Pile O'Sápmi featuring a huge screen of numerous cranial remains, which was shown at the the event Documenta 14 and later acquired by the National Museum of Oslo, where it hangs in the entrance.

Creative Expression as Activism

For many Sámi, visual expression appears the sole sphere in which they can be listened to by outsiders. In 2022, Sara was {one of three|among a group of|