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Nodding Donkeys

The Dukes Wood Oil Field in Eakring, Nottinghamshire, take the place of the first commercial onshore oil field in the United Kingdom, in the late 1930’s the wells were tapped in secrecy at the command of Winston Churchill, assisted by American oil engineers from Oklahoma brought over to drill and produce oil on the site. Oil was a main target of both allied and enemy attacks throughout the second world war. In the present day the land is preserved for the nature that dominates the space, evidence of the lands working past is still visible decommissioned pump jacks and a tailings pond still exist there. This work aims to explore the space, history and machinery used to extract oil. 

 

Using the theories of Guy Debord, Walter Benjamin and Military Industrial Complex, to extract information and inform the imagery made around a site with such prominent ties to the second world war, mechanical process and spectacular in its nature in the modern day but also historically spectacular.

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