Rena Effendi’s photography unapologetically juxtaposes the problems of international capitalism, urbanisation, the run-down state of post-conflict societies and corruption, with the resistance at the core of everyday life.
Her photographic series Pipe Dreams: A Chronicle of Lives Along the Pipeline (2002-2007), follows the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline, focusing on the effects of the oil industry on people’s lives. The 1,700 kilometres of crude oil pipeline is the second longest pipeline in the world, connecting the oil fields in the Caspian Sea with the Turkish port of Ceyhan in the Mediterranean. It has a tremendous geopolitical influence on the whole Caucasus region, and particularly on the three countries through which it passes (as well as the fourth country, Armenia, which was bypassed by construction). The pipeline was built with substantial US and Western European involvement, and is seen by many as a sign of diminishing Russian influence in the region.
The photographs were taken over a six-year period, which spanned the pipeline’s construction and the opening in 2006. The documentary photographs show the devastation caused by the activities of international capitalism in conflict situations, everyday resistance to its side effects and the vague promises of progress fuelled by petro-dollars.