Join Boom and Dust creators Jason Reed and Barry Stone as they discuss their new project with Philly-based artist Kristen Neville Taylor and Ulises co-founder Ricky Yanas. The conversation will focus on the limits and possibilities of lens-based representation in a saturated, embattled media field and the implications of imaging extracted landscapes in New Jersey, Texas, and beyond in light of $40 billion in recently granted fossil fuel subsidies, as oil and gas production hits record high in the United States.
About Boom and Dust:
Boom and Dust depicts a 40-mile stretch of highway between Midland and Odessa, Texas. This roadway serves as the backbone of the extraction industry in the Permian Basin, the most productive oil field in the world. Inspired by Ed Ruscha, Reed and Stone produced hundreds of photographs from the back of a pickup truck of the unrelenting scroll of mancamps, pumpjacks, and oil outfitters collectively known as the "Petroplex.” These were assembled as a 128-panel accordion fold book that extends to 58 feet in length when unfurled. A soundscape of field recordings and guitar improvisations from across the Permian Basin—featuring collaged sounds of highways, toxic artificial lakes, and oil fields, all layered with lap steel guitar—can be accessed through a QR code printed in the colophon on the bellyband, or as a special edition cassette.
