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Guests to the renowned gallery are accustomed to unexpected encounters in its spacious Turbine Hall. They've relaxed under an man-made sun, glided down amusement rides, and witnessed robotic sea creatures floating through the air. Yet this marks the initial time they will be venturing themselves in the complex nose cavities of a reindeer. The newest artistic project for this cavernous space—developed by Native Sámi artist Máret Ánne Sara—invites visitors into a winding design modeled after the enlarged interior of a reindeer's nose cavities. Inside, they can stroll around or relax on pelts, listening on headphones to tribal seniors imparting narratives and wisdom.

Why the Nose?

Why the nose? It could seem playful, but the installation pays tribute to a rarely recognized scientific wonder: scientists have found that in less than one second, the reindeer's nose can warm the incoming air it breathes in by 80 degrees celsius, enabling the animal to endure in inhospitable Arctic climates. Expanding the nose to bigger than a person, Sara explains, "generates a perception of inferiority that you as a person are not dominant over nature." Sara is a former journalist, writer for kids, and land defender, who is from a reindeer-herding family in northern Norway. "Maybe that generates the possibility to shift your perspective or spark some humbleness," she continues.

An Homage to Indigenous Heritage

The maze-like installation is one of several features in Sara's absorbing commission celebrating the culture, science, and philosophy of the Sámi, the continent's original inhabitants. Semi-nomadic, the Sámi number about 100,000 people spread across the Norwegian north, the Finnish Arctic, Sweden, and Russia's Kola Peninsula (an territory they call Sápmi). They've endured persecution, forced assimilation, and eradication of their language by all four states. Through highlighting the reindeer, an animal at the center of the Sámi belief system and origin tale, the installation also draws attention to the people's challenges associated with the global warming, property rights, and external control.

Meaning in Materials

On the lengthy entry incline, there's a towering, 26-metre formation of skins ensnared by power and light cables. It serves as a symbol for the societal frameworks restricting the Sámi. Partly a utility pole, part heavenly staircase, this section of the exhibit, named Goavve-, relates to the Sámi term for an extreme weather phenomenon, in which thick sheets of ice develop as varying temperatures thaw and solidify again the snow, encasing the reindeers' main winter sustenance, moss. The condition is a result of global heating, which is taking place up to much more rapidly in the Polar region than in other regions.

A few years back, I visited Sara in the Norwegian far north during a severe cold period 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 provide by hand. The reindeer crowded round us, pawing the frozen ground in futility for mossy morsels. This resource-intensive and laborious process is having a significant impact on reindeer husbandry—and on the animals' natural survival. But the choice is starvation. As these icy periods become routine, reindeer are perishing—a number from starvation, others drowning after plunging into lakes and rivers through prematurely melting ice. To some extent, the work is a tribute to them. "With the layering of materials, in a way I'm introducing the condition to London," says Sara.

Contrasting Belief Systems

This artwork also underscores the stark difference between the western interpretation of power as a commodity to be utilized for gain and existence and the Sámi philosophy of life force as an inherent essence in animals, people, and nature. The gallery's legacy as a fossil fuel plant is connected to this, as is what the Sámi see as green colonialism by Scandinavian states. In their efforts to be exemplars for renewable energy, these states have locked horns with the Sámi over the development of windfarms, river barriers, and extraction sites on their traditional territory; the Sámi argue their legal protections, ways of life, and culture are threatened. "It's challenging being such a limited population to stand your ground when the justifications are grounded in saving the world," Sara observes. "Resource exploitation has adopted the language of sustainability, but still it's just aiming to find more suitable ways to persist in patterns of use."

Personal Challenges

The artist and her family have personally disagreed with the Norwegian government over its increasingly stringent rules on animal husbandry. Previously, Sara's sibling undertook a set of ultimately unsuccessful lawsuits over the forced culling of his livestock, ostensibly to stop excessive feeding. To back him, Sara created a extended collection of artworks named Pile O'Sápmi featuring a colossal drape of 400 animal bones, which was exhibited at the 2017 event Documenta 14 and later obtained by the national institution, where it hangs in the entrance.

Creative Expression as Advocacy

Among the community, visual expression seems the exclusive sphere in which they can be understood by the global community. Recently, Sara was {one of three|among a group of|