Attendees to Tate Modern are familiar to surprising encounters in its spacious Turbine Hall. They have relaxed under an artificial sun, descended down helter skelters, and seen AI-powered sea creatures drifting through the air. Yet this marks the initial time they will be venturing themselves in the complex nose passages of a reindeer. The latest artist commission for this huge space—designed by Indigenous Sámi artist Máret Ánne Sara—invites gallerygoers into a maze-like structure inspired by the scaled-up interior of a reindeer's nasal cavities. Once inside, they can wander around or chill out on reindeer hides, tuning in on earphones to tribal seniors sharing stories and knowledge.
What's the focus on the nose? It may sound whimsical, but the artwork honors a little-known natural marvel: experts have uncovered that in a fraction of a second, the reindeer's nose can warm the surrounding air it takes in by 80 degrees celsius, helping the creature to survive in extreme Arctic climates. Expanding the nose to human-scale dimensions, Sara explains, "generates a sense of insignificance that you as a person are not in control over nature." She is a ex- journalist, young adult author, and land defender, who comes from a pastoral family in the far north of Norway. "Maybe that generates the possibility to change your perspective or evoke some humility," she continues.
The maze-like design is among various components in Sara's immersive art project celebrating the heritage, understanding, and philosophy of the Sámi, the continent's original inhabitants. Traditionally mobile, the Sámi number roughly 100,000 people distributed across northern Norway, Finland, Sweden, and the Russian Arctic (an area they call Sápmi). They have faced persecution, integration policies, and suppression of their dialect by all four states. By focusing on the reindeer, an creature at the core of the Sámi mythology and creation story, the art also draws attention to the group's struggles relating to the climate crisis, loss of territory, and imperialism.
On the long entry slope, there's a soaring, 26-meter formation of reindeer hides ensnared by power and light cables. It represents a metaphor for the societal frameworks restricting the Sámi. Like an electrical tower, part celestial ladder, this section of the exhibit, titled Goavve-, points to the Sámi word for an extreme weather phenomenon, in which solid coatings of ice develop as varying weather melt and refreeze the snow, encasing the reindeers' primary winter sustenance, moss. The condition is a result of global heating, which is occurring up to much more rapidly in the Far North than elsewhere.
A few years back, I visited Sara in Guovdageaidnu during a goavvi winter and went with Sámi reindeer keepers on their motorized sleds in biting cold as they carried trailers of animal nutrition on to the wind-scoured Arctic plains to distribute through labor. The reindeer gathered round us, scratching the icy ground in vain attempts for vegetative pieces. This expensive and laborious method is having a drastic impact on reindeer husbandry—and on the animals' natural survival. Yet the alternative is starvation. As goavvi winters become routine, reindeer are dying—some from hunger, others suffocating after plunging into lakes and rivers through thinning ice sheets. In a sense, the art is a tribute to them. "Through the stacking of components, in a way I'm transporting the condition to London," says Sara.
The installation also underscores the stark contrast between the industrial interpretation of power as a commodity to be harnessed for economic benefit and survival and the Sámi outlook of vitality as an inherent life force in animals, humans, and nature. This venue's legacy as a fossil fuel plant is linked with this, as is what the Sámi view as eco-imperialism by Nordic countries. In their efforts to be exemplars for renewable energy, Nordic nations have clashed with the Sámi over the construction of wind energy projects, hydroelectric dams, and mines on their traditional territory; the Sámi assert their legal protections, livelihoods, and traditions are at risk. "It's very difficult being such a tiny group to protect your rights when the arguments are grounded in global sustainability," Sara comments. "Mining practices has adopted the language of sustainability, but still it's just aiming to find more suitable ways to maintain patterns of use."
She and her kin have themselves conflicted with the state authorities over its tightening rules on reindeer management. Previously, Sara's sibling embarked on a series of finally failed court actions over the forced culling of his animals, supposedly to stop overgrazing. In support, Sara produced a four-year series of pieces called Pile O'Sápmi comprising a colossal screen of 400 animal bones, which was displayed at the 2017 event Documenta 14 and later obtained by the public gallery, where it is displayed in the entryway.
For many Sámi, creative work is the sole realm in which they can be listened to by the global community. Recently, Sara was {one of three|among a group of|
