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Visitors to the renowned gallery are accustomed to surprising encounters in its spacious Turbine Hall. They've relaxed under an simulated sun, descended down helter skelters, and witnessed robotic jellyfish drifting through the air. But this marks the initial time they will be engaging themselves in the detailed nasal passages of a reindeer. The newest artist commission for this cavernous space—developed by Native Sámi creator Máret Ánne Sara—invites patrons into a winding structure based on the enlarged interior of a reindeer's nasal cavities. Upon entering, they can meander around or unwind on skins, tuning in on earphones to tribal seniors telling tales and wisdom.

Why the Nose?

What's the focus on the nose? It could sound whimsical, but the artwork pays tribute to a obscure scientific wonder: experts have discovered that in less than one second, the reindeer's nose can warm the incoming air it takes in by 80°C, enabling the animal to survive in inhospitable Arctic temperatures. Expanding the nose to human-scale dimensions, Sara notes, "creates a perception of insignificance that you as a human being are not superior over nature." The artist is a ex- journalist, children's author, and land defender, who hails from a pastoral family in northern Norway. "Possibly that generates the potential to alter your outlook or spark some humbleness," she adds.

A Celebration to Traditional Ways

The winding structure is among various elements in Sara's engaging commission honoring the traditions, understanding, and beliefs of the Sámi, the continent's original inhabitants. Semi-nomadic, the Sámi total approximately 100,000 people ranged across the Norwegian north, the Finnish Arctic, Sweden, and the Russian Arctic (an territory they call Sápmi). They have faced oppression, forced assimilation, and suppression of their tongue by all four nations. Through highlighting the reindeer, an creature at the center of the Sámi cosmology and creation story, the art also draws attention to the group's issues connected to the environmental emergency, loss of territory, and external control.

Symbolism in Materials

On the long entrance incline, there's a soaring, 26-meter structure of skins entangled by electrical wires. It can be read as a analogy for the political and economic systems limiting the Sámi. Partly a utility pole, part spiritual ascent, this component of the exhibit, titled Goavve-, refers to the Sámi term for an extreme weather phenomenon, whereby thick layers of ice develop as changing weather melt and solidify again the snow, locking in the reindeers' main winter nourishment, moss. Goavvi is a consequence of global heating, which is happening up to much more rapidly in the Far North than globally.

A few years back, I visited Sara in Guovdageaidnu during a severe cold period and went with Sámi herders on their motorized sleds in freezing temperatures as they hauled containers of food pellets on to the exposed tundra to provide by hand. These animals gathered round us, pawing the icy ground in vain for lichen-covered morsels. This expensive and labour-intensive process is having a significant impact on reindeer husbandry—and on the animals' independence. But the choice is death. When such conditions become frequent, reindeer are succumbing—some from lack of food, others drowning after plunging into lakes and rivers through thinning ice sheets. On one level, the art is a monument to them. "Through the stacking of materials, in a way I'm bringing the goavvi to London," says Sara.

Diverging Worldviews

The sculpture also underscores the sharp contrast between the western interpretation of energy as a asset to be harnessed for economic benefit and livelihood and the Sámi worldview of life force as an inherent essence in creatures, people, and the environment. The gallery's history as a industrial facility is connected to this, as is what the Sámi see as eco-imperialism by Nordic countries. In their efforts to be leaders for sustainable power, these states have clashed with the Sámi over the construction of turbine fields, hydroelectric dams, and mines on their native soil; the Sámi argue their legal protections, livelihoods, and culture are at risk. "It's challenging being such a tiny group to stand your ground when the arguments are based on environmental protection," Sara comments. "Extractivism has appropriated the rhetoric of environmentalism, but yet it's just aiming to find alternative ways to maintain habits of expenditure."

Individual Conflicts

She and her kin have personally conflicted with the Norwegian government over its increasingly stringent policies on reindeer management. A few years ago, Sara's brother undertook a series of ultimately unsuccessful legal cases over the required reduction of his livestock, supposedly to stop overgrazing. To back him, Sara created a multi-year set of pieces titled Pile O'Sápmi featuring a massive screen of numerous reindeer skulls, which was exhibited at the 2017's art exhibition Documenta 14 and later purchased by the National Museum of Oslo, where it resides in the entrance.

The Role of Art in Awareness

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