SOCAR Oil Fields #3, Baku, Azerbaijan, 2006
Edward Burtynsky, SOCAR Oil Fields #3, Baku, Azerbaijan, 2006.
Burtynsky surveys the oil and gas industry at a broad socio-cultural scale in his Oil series, to which this image, SOCAR Oil Fields #3, Baku, Azerbaijan, belongs. This is a mature oil field supporting various generations of extraction equipment to form a perspective of black lines. In this vista, the drilling and pumping structures—derricks and pumpjacks used for ongoing extraction—along with the highly reflective pond that fills the lower half of the picture, choke out any remaining evidence of life in a barren landscape that has been given over entirely to industry. It should be noted that the mirror-like pond is not water but crude oil, making the scene even more disquieting while it flaunts a surfeit of commodity.
Edward Burtynsky, SOCAR Oil Fields #6, Baku, Azerbaijan, 2006.
Oil and gas represent from 40 to 50 per cent of Azerbaijan’s gross domestic product, but 90 per cent of its exports.2 The State Oil Company of the Republic of Azerbaijan (SOCAR) plays a central role in the exploitation. Azerbaijan’s national economy relies overwhelmingly on this non-renewable resource for its sovereign wealth and its population’s standard of living. Baku has grown substantially since the turn of the century as the capital of a country that provides an alternative to Russian energy. This makes it particularly attractive to European markets wary of funding their chronically belligerent oil-rich neighbour to the east.
Seen in isolation, SOCAR Oil Fields #3 reads as a stark formal exercise, but this broader economic and geopolitical context is crucial to understanding the work as a synechdoche for systemic dependence on a non-renewable resource. Burtynsky has invested the picture with an ironic lyricism through a judicious concentration on the dynamic symmetry of its geometry. The high contrast between the black structures outlined against a white sky—mirrored in a broad still pool of oil that fills the foreground—make this picture a particularly austere example of his signature aesthetic ambivalence. The sterile dirt that serves as a horizon in this monochromatic panorama emphasizes the dystopian reading without compromising its compositional elegance.
Gallery
Edward Burtynsky, Railcuts #1, C.N. Track, Skihist Provincial Park, British Columbia, 1985, chromogenic colour print on paper, 68.7 x 86.6 cm (image).
Edward Burtynsky, Carrara Marble Quarries #24 & #25, Carrara, Italy (diptych), 1993, chromogenic colour print on paper, 68.2 x 86.2 cm (image); 76.4 x 101.4 cm (image), National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa.
Edward Burtynsky, Nickel Tailings #34 & #35, Sudbury, Ontario (diptych), 1996, chromogenic colour print on paper, 80.7 x 111.1 cm (sheet); 80.7 x 111.1 cm (sheet), National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa.
Edward Burtynsky, Oxford Tire Pile #8, Westley, California, USA, 1999, chromogenic colour print on paper, 28.6 x 37.8 cm (image); 40.7 x 5.7 cm (sheet).
Edward Burtynsky, Shipbreaking #13, Chittagong, Bangladesh, 2000, chromogenic colour print on paper, 43.6 x 55.88 cm (image/sheet).
Edward Burtynsky, Wan Zhou #2, Three Gorges Dam Project, Yangtze River, China, 2002, chromogenic colour print on paper, 68.6 x 86.4 (image/sheet).
Edward Burtynsky, SOCAR Oil Fields #3, Baku, Azerbaijan, 2006.
Edward Burtynsky, Breezewood, Pennsylvania, USA, 2008.
Edward Burtynsky, Pivot Irrigation #7, High Plains, Texas Panhandle, USA, 2011, chromogenic colour print on paper, 107.2 x 304.8 cm (image/sheet).
Edward Burtynsky, Phosphor Tailings Pond #4, Near Lakeland, Florida, USA, 2006, pigment inkjet print on Kodak Professional photo paper, 148.59 x 198.12 cm (image/sheet).
Edward Burtynsky, Pengah Wall #1, Komodo National Park, Indonesia, 2017, pigment inkjet print on Kodak Professional photo paper, 121.9 x 218.4 cm (image/sheet).
Edward Burtynsky, Tailings Pond #2, Wasselton Diamond Mine, Kimberley, Northern Cape, South Africa, 2018, pigment inkjet print on Kodak Professional photo paper, 99 x 132.08 cm (image/sheet).
Edward Burtynsky, Natural Order #33, Grey County, Ontario, Canada, Spring, 2020.
Edward Burtynsky, In the Wake of Progress, 2022.