The Boru* Project

The idea for The Freedom Well started with The Boru Project, an as yet unrealized vision for a series of monuments in the Caucases in the form of oil pipes. As enormous iconic statues of dictators once helped to unify and define life in former Soviet republics, today the omnipresent pipeline performs a similar role... read on, an essay by Chingiz Babayev:

A Conceptual Art Project Proposal
"The idea of the 'Boru' art project is the way of representing of Baku-Tbilisi-Jehan oil pipeline in visual contemporary art way. This idea is planned to be staged in different countries: Azerbaijan, Georgia, Turkey, some European countries and USA, which will turn the project from national into international. As Azerbaijan's oil is transported to other countries above it is intended to nurture close political, military, economical and cultural relationships among those countries.

A pipe representing 'Boru' in the center of downtown would, as a totem, became the symbol for some peoples' hope for future prosperity. For others the pipe would symbolize eco-disaster. As a historic exhibit the pipe is very timely, reflecting real facts about what defines the hopes and fears of people today. Present time and history should be documented as it is. This is the contemporary "Mona Lisa," and not just for Baku.

Oil economics and politics are important players in the history of both Azerbaijan and USA, and we are the participants of this history. This history is being written, unfortunately with our complicity, so that the future generation will view these "oil affairs" as historic fact. We should be sure to render the serious realities in a historic context (the pipe) so that history records our voices also."

*BORU- tube, pipe (translation from Azeri)

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