In 2014 I was in a boat crossing the Tigris river from Syria into Iraq, when an American journalist remarked in awe of all the things the river can and had seen. It travels through Mosul (at the time, occupied by ISIS), and then Baghdad and Basra. Multiple cities, histories and civilisations, all laid out along the same thread. Gilgamesh, the ancient king of Mesopotamia, crossed waters by boat in search of eternal life. Unlike Gilgamesh, I wasn't too sure what I was doing there. I have memories of my childhood, being driven to school everyday and hearing the news on the radio of the Iraq war. Growing up with the war as a backdrop brought up difficult and confusing questions about the role of the UK in the world. Are we a force for good? Why are we really there? Was Iraq really a danger to us? Was it right?.
I like to tell myself that the river has a memory. The river watches over the on-going civilisations, seeing the signs, symbols and patterns of life fade away over time. Re-emerge many lifetimes later, though their former meanings may be forgotten. Like the erosion and break up of rocks into pebbles in the river bed, memories fade and collect. I returned many times to the river. My subjects an odd collection of events, non-events, scenes and subjects, found near or on the banks that this water has cut, in a place that had some strange abstract connect to my teenagehood.
This project, "Bildungsroman", is the first part in a series of three separate, but connected projects, set in the Arab world and Europe, titled "Arabia Opus 2014-2020". The projects follow the Tigris river through Iraq, explore the Syrian crisis, and then wander out into the Arabian landscape. Each project looks at different subjects and universal themes, and the overall series seems to be my response to issues with globalism, power, and impressions made upon me during my teenage years, particularly with the Iraq war and War On Terror."
Oliver Tooke is a British photographer based in Bristol. He is currently on his final year of the MA Photography course at the University of the West of England. During his studies he has been shooting and consolidating a series of projects that he has been working on for almost seven years. All of the projects are still a work in progress, but this year he is working towards a self published set of booklets of the work titled Arabia Opus 2014-2020.