[INTRO]
[BACKGROUND]
[ARTISTIC METHOD]
[LEVELS OF REFLECTION]
[STRUCTURE AND DESIGN]
[LINKS]

The culturally diverse and historically agitated Southern Caucasus is a connective space between Russian, Central Asian and Middle Eastern regions, which finds itself in a transitory post-socialist condition. The area is crisscrossed by old and new trading and migration routes and, most importantly, by oil and gas pipelines. Various large-scale projects in the transportation, communication and energy extracting sectors are now under construction and Europe wants to play a part in reconstructing this Super Silk Road. Recognizing the great interest in linking up with energy-rich Central Asia by building tracks that will neither lead through Russian nor through Iranian territory, the EU started investment plans in 1991. The major players in the region, however, are transnational oil corporations.
The Black Sea Files concentrate on the largest of the development projects which runs through the entire region connecting the Caspian to the Mediterranean Sea: The Baku-T’bilissi-Ceyhan (BTC) oil pipeline passing through Azerbaijan, Georgia and Turkey. It’s expected to be the answer to the headaches caused by the longstanding question of how to pipe the Caspian crude to the West. The history of this gigantic transnational project, also starting in 1991 with the first bid of Amoco for Azeri oil fields, is intricately tied to the political transformations in the area. Tracing the negotiations, development and management of the pipeline inevitably means to touch on the major political and historical issues related to the post-cold war/post-socialist period and the high corporate stakes in the region.

The large-scale construction project is a perfect reflection of the transitory moment of the area and its historical importance as a passage for major forces. The multiple conduits and fibers put down for the flow of crude oil, electricity and data determine this cartography of transit. Only at the moment of construction are these processes visible; within months they will be forever buried. Then the scraped and dug up topography will return to its rural, disconnected condition while high tech underground infrastructures invisibly pump energy to the Western markets. The video captures the gigantic material and physical effort involved in building the ducts. In doing so, it contrasts most current representations of data flow and energy which indicate a boundless and effortless, even magic transfer and supply of energy. The research and video project aims at exposing the hidden matrix of this political space.

The transnational aspects regarding the making of the pipeline emerges in every stage of the process: In the political players and the consortium who back it; in the financial structures and the technical and material supplies; in the workforce of the contracting firms and even the catering services at the workers camps where Indian, Lebanese and Colombian construction workers are served food delivered from Holland because the camp in run by a Dutch man.