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Guests to Tate Modern are used to unexpected displays in its spacious Turbine Hall. They've relaxed under an artificial sun, descended down helter skelters, and observed AI-powered sea creatures hovering through the air. Yet this marks the initial time they will be immersing themselves in the detailed nose passages of a reindeer. The latest artistic project for this huge space—designed by Indigenous Sámi artist Máret Ánne Sara—encourages visitors into a winding design inspired by the expanded interior of a reindeer's nose cavities. Upon entering, they can stroll around or relax on pelts, tuning in on headphones to Sámi elders telling stories and knowledge.

Why the Nose?

What's the focus on the nose? It might sound whimsical, but the artwork celebrates a obscure biological feat: researchers have discovered that in a fraction of a second, the reindeer's nose can heat the incoming air it breathes in by 80 degrees celsius, helping the creature to endure in extreme Arctic climates. Enlarging the nose to larger than human size, Sara notes, "produces a feeling of insignificance that you as a human being are not in control over nature." She is a former reporter, writer for kids, and land defender, who is from a reindeer-herding family in the far north of Norway. "Perhaps that generates the potential to change your viewpoint or trigger some modesty," she adds.

A Tribute to Sámi Culture

The labyrinthine design is one of several components in Sara's engaging exhibition showcasing the traditions, understanding, and philosophy of the Sámi, the sole native group in Europe. Partially migratory, the Sámi total roughly 100,000 people distributed across the Norwegian north, the Finnish Arctic, Sweden, and the Kola region (an region they call Sápmi). They've faced discrimination, cultural suppression, and repression of their dialect by all four countries. By focusing on the reindeer, an creature at the heart of the Sámi belief system and founding narrative, the installation also draws attention to the people's challenges relating to the environmental emergency, loss of territory, and colonialism.

Symbolism in Materials

Along the lengthy entry ramp, there's a soaring, 26-meter structure of skins trapped by utility lines. It represents a metaphor for the political and economic systems constraining the Sámi. Like an electrical tower, part spiritual ascent, this part of the artwork, titled Goavve-, relates to the Sámi term for an extreme weather phenomenon, whereby thick coatings of ice develop as varying temperatures liquefy and ice over the snow, encasing the reindeers' main cold-season food, moss. The condition is a result of global heating, which is occurring up to four times faster in the Arctic than in other regions.

Previously, I met with Sara in a remote town during a severe cold period and accompanied Sámi pastoralists on their motorized sleds in biting cold as they transported containers of animal nutrition on to the exposed frozen landscape to distribute through labor. These animals surrounded round us, pawing the slippery ground in vain for lichen-covered pieces. This expensive and demanding procedure is having a significant effect on animal rearing—and on the animals' self-sufficiency. However the choice is starvation. As these icy periods become frequent, reindeer are dying—some from hunger, others submerging after plunging into water bodies through prematurely melting ice. To some extent, the art is a memorial to them. "Through the stacking of elements, in a way I'm bringing the phenomenon to London," says Sara.

Contrasting Worldviews

This artwork also emphasizes the clear contrast between the industrial view of electricity as a asset to be exploited for economic benefit and existence and the Sámi philosophy of energy as an inherent power in creatures, people, and nature. The gallery's history as a fossil fuel plant is connected to this, as is what the Sámi consider environmental exploitation by Nordic countries. As they strive to be standard bearers for clean sources, Scandinavian countries have locked horns with the Sámi over the construction of windfarms, water power facilities, and mines on their native soil; the Sámi contend their fundamental freedoms, ways of life, and culture are endangered. "It's very difficult being such a small minority to protect your rights when the reasons are rooted in global sustainability," Sara notes. "Mining practices has appropriated the discourse of ecology, but yet it's just aiming to find alternative ways to continue habits of consumption."

Individual Challenges

Sara and her relatives have themselves disagreed with the state authorities over its tightening rules on animal husbandry. A few years ago, Sara's brother embarked on a series of unsuccessful legal cases over the forced culling of his herd, ostensibly to stop overgrazing. In support, Sara developed a multi-year series of creations titled Pile O'Sápmi comprising a massive screen of numerous animal bones, which was displayed at the the show Documenta 14 and later acquired by the National Museum of Oslo, where it resides in the entrance.

The Role of Art in Advocacy

For numerous Indigenous people, visual expression appears the exclusive sphere in which they can be listened to by people of other nations. Two years ago, Sara was {one of three|among a group of|