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Guests to Tate Modern are familiar to unusual displays in its spacious Turbine Hall. They have sunbathed under an man-made sun, glided down amusement rides, and observed robotic jellyfish floating through the air. However this marks the first time they will be immersing themselves in the intricate nasal cavities of a reindeer. The newest artist commission for this huge space—designed by Native Sámi artist Máret Ánne Sara—welcomes gallerygoers into a maze-like structure based on the scaled-up interior of a reindeer's nasal cavities. Once inside, they can meander around or unwind on skins, tuning in on earphones to community leaders imparting stories and wisdom.

The Significance of the Nose

Why the nose? It could appear quirky, but the exhibit honors a rarely recognized scientific wonder: researchers have uncovered that in a fraction of a second, the reindeer's nose can raise the temperature of the incoming air it inhales by 80 degrees celsius, allowing the creature to thrive in extreme Arctic conditions. Enlarging the nose to human-scale dimensions, Sara explains, "generates a sense of insignificance that you as a individual are not superior over nature." She is a former journalist, children's author, and land defender, who hails from a pastoral family in the far north of Norway. "Perhaps that creates the chance to alter your viewpoint or trigger some humbleness," she continues.

A Tribute to Indigenous Heritage

The labyrinthine design is one of several features in Sara's immersive commission honoring the heritage, knowledge, and beliefs of the Sámi, Europe's only Indigenous people. Traditionally mobile, the Sámi count roughly 100,000 people ranged across northern Norway, the Finnish Arctic, the Swedish Lapland, and the Kola region (an region they call Sápmi). They have endured persecution, integration policies, and repression of their dialect by all four states. With an emphasis on the reindeer, an animal at the center of the Sámi mythology and founding narrative, the installation also highlights the group's struggles associated with the climate crisis, land dispossession, and colonialism.

Meaning in Materials

At the extended entrance ramp, there's a towering, 26-meter formation of pelts ensnared by electrical wires. It can be read as a analogy for the governance and financial structures constraining the Sámi. Partly a utility pole, part heavenly staircase, this section of the installation, called Goavve-, points to the Sámi name for an severe climatic event, in which solid layers of ice appear as changing conditions liquefy and refreeze the snow, locking in the reindeers' primary cold-season food, lichen. This phenomenon is a consequence of planetary warming, which is taking place up to at an accelerated rate in the Polar region than elsewhere.

Three years ago, I visited Sara in Guovdageaidnu during a severe cold period and went with Sámi herders on their snowmobiles in freezing temperatures as they transported carts of animal nutrition on to the exposed Arctic plains to distribute by hand. These animals crowded round us, scratching the icy ground in vain attempts for vegetative bits. This resource-intensive and demanding method is having a significant impact on herding practices—and on the animals' independence. However the other option is starvation. When such conditions become frequent, reindeer are dying—a number from starvation, others drowning after falling into lakes and rivers through prematurely melting ice. On one level, the installation is a tribute to them. "By overlapping of materials, in a way I'm introducing the goavvi to London," says Sara.

Opposing Perspectives

The sculpture also highlights the stark difference between the industrial interpretation of electricity as a asset to be exploited for economic benefit and survival and the Sámi philosophy of vitality as an inherent essence in creatures, individuals, and the environment. The gallery's history as a industrial facility is connected to this, as is what the Sámi consider eco-imperialism by regional governments. In their efforts to be leaders for renewable energy, these states have clashed with the Sámi over the development of turbine fields, hydroelectric dams, and extraction sites on their native soil; the Sámi contend their human rights, ways of life, and culture are threatened. "It's hard being such a tiny group to defend yourself when the arguments are based on saving the world," Sara notes. "Mining practices has adopted the rhetoric of sustainability, but yet it's just aiming to find better ways to continue patterns of use."

Individual Challenges

The artist and her kin have themselves conflicted with the state authorities over its increasingly stringent policies on herding. In 2016, Sara's sibling undertook a series of finally failed lawsuits over the mandatory slaughter of his animals, ostensibly to stop vegetation depletion. To back him, Sara produced a extended collection of artworks called Pile O'Sápmi featuring a huge curtain of four hundred animal bones, which was shown at the the art exhibition Documenta 14 and later obtained by the public gallery, where it hangs in the lobby.

Art as Awareness

For many Sámi, visual expression appears the exclusive realm in which they can be understood by people of other nations. Recently, Sara was {one of three|among a group of|