Wang Bing's 2008 installation Crude Oil follows the activities of the workers of a remote oil field in Gobi desert in real time, from one night to the next; created in an unique blend of direct cinema and structural film and presented in two parts. In order to better accommodate my thoughts, I will furthur break the film into a total of four parts and accompany them with specific headers and approximate spans.

Part 1.1 Ontology, Ambiance & Multiplicities ~ 8 PM to 12 AM

After a minute of colour bars saturated with acute drones and a minute more with black screen and silence, Wang introduces four long takes of unequal holds that are not until later revealed to be originating from a single confinement: a sleeping man, faint conversations; a symmetric shot of a cabin illuminated by a sodium bulb; a sitting man, a table and a flask; and an angular shot of a chamber (LED bulb) with windows to an adjacent room (Sodium vapour bulb). This sequence prompts two parallel engagements: the artist outlining the rhizomes of the cabin and the viewer unearthing them, such interactions are an integral part of the work. There are sometimes slight readjustments of the camera, revealing details to moment's notice; and ultrastructural fluxes of the rhizomes comprised of various multiplicities (lights, doors, mirrors, windows etc). Layers of exostructural phosphorescence is a recurrent theme throughout: the vacant cabin, opened door and colossal noise outside; the gaze of the camera invites the viewer to imagine the flavours of outdoors into the room or just sit still in solitude; creating visions in real time. Wang also tinkers with the virtual space and acoustics, solely through camera placements; turning a simple room into a flux of constant discoveries. The ending scene is especially beautiful: workers coming inside, smoking, gossiping, listening to music, falling asleep, waking up, chatting again, smoking again, falling asleep again. The remains of the night are signified by a 25 minute silent black screen.

Part 1.2 Frames, Noises & Mechanisms ~ 4 AM to 10 AM

The events from the last night at the cabin are perpetuated before two shots of the outdoors appear for the first time: Gobi desert at dawn and then again in the morning with the oil field visible. As opposed to the immersive observation of the previous part, systematic viewing is the key here. Wang Bing extracts countless details from an apparent mundaneness, through routinely sustained takes (5 shots of the same place, 3 hours) and a pentamorphic telepathy of images and sounds; thus creating an intimacy-junction among energies, mechanisms and organisms. Quite reminiscent of the Egyptian factory scene from Straub-Huillet's Trop Tot Trop Tard (workers leaving, viewers entering) but here instead the workers, the filmmaker and the viewers are all entering the factory at once. These scenes are of tremendous power and directly challenges our constructed notions of arts; and in such Crude Oil is about internal revolution as much as it is about oppressed lives.

Part 2.1 Aerial Emergence ~ 12 PM to 4 PM

The freest piece of the installation; Wang Bing's camera shakes as he moves over uneven surfaces, his shadows incidentally appear and he even speaks to a worker: "Are you taking a smoke break?" The worker finishes his cigarette and Wang follows him to the facility, the scene is strangely grand, epic even, like approaching something from within. The camera continues capturing the oil field in the manner of newsreel footages, accompanying and breaking off focuses as inclined. However, the next hour or so is terrifically unexpected and sneaks onto the threshold of consciousness like the familial spirits (of a place): an worker enters one of the cabins to check up on an unidentified article, the camera is reversed so that the open door is in view (a direct reference to an earlier take from the first part, which is another central recurrence in Crude Oil), an extended reprise of the inspecting worker follows but this time he appears to be in a reverie, a long take of another worker apparently absorbed in operating a drilling machine, same scene zoomed-in drawing attention to the reflection of the sun on an oiled rotating sphere of the machine which creates a mirage of an euphoric sun-drenched drive on itself. The only thing more astounding than this entrancing sequence is how Wang veers out of it: a reprise of the original drilling scene with another worker taking on the helm, the film has reverted to reality with the change of a workshift; echoes within echoes within echoes within..... To complement this phenomenon of distorting time with time in real time, he soon introduces the workers living quarters scene where he places recorded media into instantaneous manipulations by the occupants and the camera (a fixed but endlessly intriguing spot, where the TV screen is partially visible in a way that action films are turned into a disfigured flow of abstraction).

Part 2.2 Twilight Communion ~ 5 PM to Eternity

By the evening, Gobi desert is adorned with the splendour of twilight and figuratively, our cabins are submerged in these exostructural phosphorescences; we are no longer outsiders. Wang has teared off his shell, the ghost on the mirror; and we, this disposable event recorder, have occupied physical space therein. Outside, the drilling machine is still churning out the milk of the Earth, the workers will look up soon. Wang pulls off his last warp, tonight to eternity; the placentation of the sun has already begun:

• Written on 5 May 2020

• Poem excerpt is from "Cat and The Moon" by William Butler Yeats