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Attendees to the renowned gallery are used to unusual encounters in its expansive Turbine Hall. They've sunbathed under an artificial sun, glided down spiral slides, and seen AI-powered sea creatures floating through the air. But this marks the first time they will be immersing themselves in the detailed nose chambers of a reindeer. The latest creative installation for this huge space—created by Native Sámi creator Máret Ánne Sara—invites gallerygoers into a labyrinthine design modeled after the scaled-up interior of a reindeer's nose cavities. Once inside, they can meander around or unwind on reindeer hides, listening on headphones to tribal seniors sharing narratives and knowledge.

Why the Nose?

Why choose the nasal structure? It may seem whimsical, but the exhibit honors a little-known natural marvel: scientists have discovered that in a fraction of a second, the reindeer's nose can raise the temperature of the ambient air it inhales by 80 degrees celsius, enabling the animal to survive in harsh Arctic conditions. Scaling the nose to larger than human size, Sara says, "produces a feeling of smallness that you as a person are not superior over nature." The artist is a ex- writer, young adult author, and environmental activist, who hails from a pastoral family in northern Norway. "Maybe that generates the possibility to change your outlook or spark some humility," she adds.

A Tribute to Traditional Ways

The maze-like installation is part of a elements in Sara's immersive commission honoring the culture, knowledge, and worldview of the Sámi, Europe's only Indigenous people. Traditionally mobile, the Sámi total approximately 100,000 people ranged across northern Norway, the Finnish Arctic, Sweden, and Russia's Kola Peninsula (an area they call Sápmi). They've endured discrimination, integration policies, and eradication of their dialect by all four nations. With an emphasis on the reindeer, an creature at the core of the Sámi mythology and origin tale, the installation also highlights the group's issues associated with the environmental emergency, loss of territory, and imperialism.

Meaning in Materials

On the extended entrance slope, there's a soaring, eighty-five-foot sculpture of skins ensnared by power and light cables. It can be read as a symbol for the societal frameworks restricting the Sámi. Part pylon, part heavenly staircase, this component of the artwork, named Goavve-, points to the Sámi word for an extreme weather phenomenon, wherein solid layers of ice appear as varying temperatures thaw and refreeze the snow, locking in the reindeers' primary winter sustenance, lichen. The condition is a result of planetary warming, which is occurring up to four times faster in the Polar region than globally.

Three years ago, I traveled to see Sara in Guovdageaidnu during a severe cold period and joined Sámi pastoralists on their Arctic vehicles in freezing temperatures as they hauled carts of food pellets on to the exposed frozen landscape to distribute by hand. The herd crowded round us, digging the icy ground in vain for mossy pieces. This resource-intensive and demanding procedure is having a significant influence on reindeer husbandry—and on the animals' natural survival. Yet the alternative is malnutrition. As these icy periods become routine, reindeer are dying—a number from starvation, others submerging after plunging into streams through prematurely melting ice. In a sense, the art is a monument to them. "Through the stacking of elements, in a way I'm introducing the goavvi to London," says Sara.

Diverging Worldviews

This artwork also underscores the stark contrast between the western view of energy as a resource to be harnessed for gain and livelihood and the Sámi worldview of vitality as an inherent life force in animals, humans, and nature. The gallery's legacy as a industrial facility is connected to this, as is what the Sámi consider eco-imperialism by Scandinavian states. As they strive to be exemplars for sustainable power, Scandinavian countries have disagreed with the Sámi over the building of wind energy projects, river barriers, and digging operations on their ancestral land; the Sámi assert their legal protections, ways of life, and traditions are at risk. "It's hard being such a small minority to defend yourself when the arguments are grounded in environmental protection," Sara notes. "Extractivism has adopted the discourse of ecology, but yet it's just aiming to find more suitable ways to persist in practices of consumption."

Individual Challenges

Sara and her family have personally clashed with the Norwegian government over its tightening rules on animal husbandry. A few years ago, Sara's brother initiated a set of finally failed legal cases over the forced culling of his animals, ostensibly to stop overgrazing. To back him, Sara produced a extended set of artworks called Pile O'Sápmi comprising a colossal drape of 400 animal bones, which was displayed at the 2017 event Documenta 14 and later obtained by the national institution, where it is displayed in the entryway.

Art as Advocacy

For numerous Indigenous people, creative work seems the sole domain in which they can be heard by outsiders. Recently, Sara was {one of three|among a group of|