An Incomplete Calendar

An archival constellation from the still and moving images of the British Petroleum Archives, documenting the expansive colonial network behind the British geophysical expeditions that spanned across Iran in the early 20th century.

One Image, Two Acts examines the photographic archives of British Petroleum during its operations in Iran, unraveling BP’s widespread construction of cinemas in the oil towns of Iran. The film is a coalescence of infrastructures, images, and archives of oil wherein cinematic time and geological time mobilize different sites, temporalities, and numerous material modalities in the colonial episteme.