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Attendees to Tate Modern are used to surprising experiences in its vast Turbine Hall. They have sunbathed under an simulated sun, glided down spiral slides, and seen automated jellyfish hovering through the air. Yet this marks the first time they will be immersing themselves in the complex nose chambers of a reindeer. The latest artist commission for this cavernous space—designed by Native Sámi creator Máret Ánne Sara—invites gallerygoers into a maze-like structure based on the enlarged interior of a reindeer's nasal cavities. Once inside, they can wander around or chill out on pelts, tuning in on headphones to Sámi elders imparting stories and wisdom.

Why the Nose?

Why the nose? It may sound playful, but the installation pays tribute to a little-known biological feat: experts have uncovered that in less than one second, the reindeer's nose can raise the temperature of the incoming air it takes in by 80°C, enabling the animal to survive in inhospitable Arctic temperatures. Scaling the nose to larger than human size, Sara explains, "generates a feeling of smallness that you as a human being are not in control over nature." She is a ex- journalist, writer for kids, and rights advocate, who comes from a pastoral family in the far north of Norway. "Possibly that fosters the potential to change your perspective or evoke some humbleness," she continues.

A Tribute to Sámi Culture

The winding structure is among various components in Sara's immersive exhibition celebrating the heritage, understanding, and philosophy of the Sámi, the continent's original inhabitants. Partially migratory, the Sámi count approximately 100,000 people distributed across the Norwegian north, Finland, Sweden, and the Kola region (an area they call Sápmi). They have endured oppression, cultural suppression, and eradication of their language by all four states. With an emphasis on the reindeer, an animal at the center of the Sámi cosmology and founding narrative, the installation also highlights the people's struggles relating to the environmental emergency, property rights, and external control.

Metaphor in Materials

On the lengthy access incline, there's a soaring, 26-meter structure of skins ensnared by power and light cables. It serves as a symbol for the societal frameworks constraining the Sámi. Partly a utility pole, part heavenly staircase, this section of the exhibit, called Goavve-, points to the Sámi term for an extreme weather phenomenon, wherein thick coatings of ice develop as varying temperatures melt and solidify again the snow, encasing the reindeers' key cold-season food, lichen. Goavvi is a outcome of climate change, which is taking place up to four times faster in the Far North than elsewhere.

A few years back, I met with Sara in Guovdageaidnu during a goavvi winter and joined Sámi pastoralists on their snowmobiles in biting cold as they carried trailers of animal nutrition on to the barren tundra to distribute through labor. The herd surrounded round us, digging the icy ground in vain attempts for lichen-covered morsels. This expensive and labour-intensive procedure is having a severe impact on reindeer husbandry—and on the animals' independence. However the choice is starvation. As these icy periods become routine, reindeer are succumbing—a number from hunger, others drowning after falling into water bodies through prematurely melting ice. To some extent, the art is a memorial to them. "By overlapping of materials, in a way I'm transporting the condition to London," says Sara.

Contrasting Belief Systems

The installation also highlights the sharp divergence between the modern interpretation of energy as a commodity to be exploited for profit and livelihood and the Sámi philosophy of vitality as an natural essence in animals, individuals, and the environment. This venue's legacy as a coal and oil power station is linked with this, as is what the Sámi view as green colonialism by Nordic countries. In their efforts to be leaders for renewable energy, these states have locked horns with the Sámi over the development of wind energy projects, river barriers, and extraction sites on their native soil; the Sámi assert their fundamental freedoms, livelihoods, and way of life are threatened. "It's very difficult being such a small minority to defend yourself when the reasons are grounded in environmental protection," Sara comments. "Resource exploitation has appropriated the rhetoric of environmentalism, but yet it's just striving to find better ways to persist in habits of use."

Family Challenges

She and her kin have personally disagreed with the state authorities over its tightening rules on animal husbandry. In 2016, Sara's brother initiated a sequence of ultimately unsuccessful lawsuits over the mandatory slaughter of his livestock, ostensibly to stop vegetation depletion. As a show of solidarity, Sara developed a multi-year set of pieces named Pile O'Sápmi including a huge drape of numerous reindeer skulls, which was shown at the the event Documenta 14 and later acquired by the public gallery, where it resides in the lobby.

Art as Awareness

For numerous Indigenous people, visual expression is the sole domain in which they can be understood by the global community. Recently, Sara was {one of three|among a group of|