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Attendees to Tate Modern are familiar to surprising experiences in its spacious Turbine Hall. They've basked under an artificial sun, glided down amusement rides, and witnessed AI-powered sea creatures floating through the air. But this marks the initial time they will be engaging themselves in the intricate nasal passages of a reindeer. The latest artistic project for this huge space—created by Native Sámi artist Máret Ánne Sara—invites gallerygoers into a maze-like structure modeled after the scaled-up inside of a reindeer's nasal cavities. Inside, they can wander around or unwind on skins, tuning in on earphones to Sámi elders sharing stories and knowledge.

Focus on the Nasal Passages

What's the focus on the nose? It may appear quirky, but the artwork pays tribute to a obscure natural marvel: researchers have found that in a fraction of a second, the reindeer's nose can warm the surrounding air it takes in by eighty degrees, enabling the creature to survive in extreme Arctic conditions. Expanding the nose to human-scale dimensions, Sara notes, "creates a feeling of smallness that you as a person are not superior over nature." The artist is a ex- reporter, young adult author, and environmental activist, who hails from a herding family in the Norwegian Arctic. "Perhaps that generates the possibility to alter your viewpoint or trigger some humility," she adds.

An Homage to Indigenous Heritage

The maze-like structure is among various features in Sara's immersive exhibition honoring the traditions, knowledge, and beliefs of the Sámi, the sole native group in Europe. Partially migratory, the Sámi count about 100,000 people distributed across the Norwegian north, Finland, the Swedish Lapland, and the Russian Arctic (an region they call Sápmi). They've endured oppression, forced assimilation, and eradication of their dialect by all four nations. Through highlighting the reindeer, an creature at the heart of the Sámi cosmology and founding narrative, the work also spotlights the community's challenges connected to the global warming, loss of territory, and imperialism.

Metaphor in Elements

On the extended access slope, there's a soaring, eighty-five-foot sculpture of pelts ensnared by electrical wires. It can be read as a symbol for the political and economic systems constraining the Sámi. Like an electrical tower, part celestial ladder, this section of the exhibit, called Goavve-, refers to the Sámi name for an extreme weather phenomenon, in which thick layers of ice form as changing conditions melt and solidify again the snow, encasing the reindeers' primary winter food, lichen. This phenomenon is a outcome of climate change, which is taking place up to at an accelerated rate in the Arctic than elsewhere.

A few years back, I visited Sara in Guovdageaidnu during a icy season and went with Sámi herders on their snowmobiles in chilly conditions as they carried carts of animal nutrition on to the exposed Arctic plains to distribute manually. The herd surrounded round us, pawing the slippery ground in vain for lichen-covered bits. This costly and labour-intensive process is having a drastic impact on reindeer husbandry—and on the animals' independence. However the alternative is death. As these icy periods become commonplace, reindeer are succumbing—some from lack of food, others submerging after sinking in lakes and rivers through unstable frozen surfaces. In a sense, the art is a monument to them. "By overlapping of elements, in a way I'm transporting the goavvi to London," says Sara.

Contrasting Perspectives

This artwork also highlights the stark difference between the industrial interpretation of power as a commodity to be harnessed for gain and existence and the Sámi worldview of energy as an natural essence in creatures, individuals, and the environment. This venue's legacy as a industrial facility is linked with this, as is what the Sámi view as eco-imperialism by Nordic countries. As they strive to be exemplars for renewable energy, Nordic nations have clashed with the Sámi over the construction of wind energy projects, river barriers, and extraction sites on their ancestral land; the Sámi contend their legal protections, incomes, and way of life are at risk. "It's challenging being such a limited population to protect your rights when the arguments are based on environmental protection," Sara observes. "Extractivism has adopted the rhetoric of environmentalism, but yet it's just striving to find more suitable ways to maintain practices of expenditure."

Personal Challenges

She and her kin have themselves clashed with the national administration over its tightening regulations on reindeer management. In 2016, Sara's brother initiated a set of unsuccessful legal cases over the required reduction of his animals, supposedly to stop vegetation depletion. As a show of solidarity, Sara developed a multi-year set of creations named Pile O'Sápmi featuring a huge drape of numerous animal bones, which was displayed at the 2017's art exhibition Documenta 14 and later acquired by the National Museum of Oslo, where it is displayed in the entryway.

The Role of Art in Advocacy

For numerous Indigenous people, art is the only domain in which they can be listened to by the global community. In 2022, Sara was {one of three|among a group of|