Oil + Water
Ruth Beer
Video Screening as part of Petro-Shorts
Curated by Shannon Webb-Campbell
The Rooms, St. John’s NFLD Petro-Shorts
Description of video
Oil and Water (2 minute video) highlights the complex conditions regarding overlapping and contested terrain where cultural heritage including historic and aboriginal trade routes, and the development of natural resource extraction industries including proposed crude oil pipelines, share the geography of remote northwest regions of Canada. The video poetically interweaves images and sounds of water and oil, fishing and refineries, rivers and tar sand pits that are intermeshed with sounds of people talking to suggest the need to reconsider a national identity based on the imaginary of empty wilderness. It emphasizes the dilemmas facing the nation with regards to petroculture and sustainability; to the risks and benefits to the environment, culture and the economy and a future imaginary.
Other Videos:
“Fountain” (2005), Rebecca Belmore
“Oil Wells: Sturgeon Road & 97th Street” (2002), Christina Battle, 16mm, colour, 3 minutes
“Petrolia” (2005), Emily Richardson, 21 min
“Deep Weather” (2013), Ursula Biemann, 9 minutes
“Basin” (2010), David Geiss, 7:47 minutes
Review in The Overcast by Shannon Webb-Campbell
