Part of “The Shortest Distance Between Two Points” project, The “Steel Rings” are sculptures that replicate the TAPLine pipeline in ten centimeters sections. Each one is engraved with the distance from the pipe's source and its corresponding geographic coordinates, making each “Steel Ring” a unique piece. The rings in the Saradar Collection correspond to the five borders the pipeline crossed from Saudi Arabia to Lebanon. Passing through Jordan and Syria, one of its sections, situated in the Golan Heights, became under Israeli occupation after the June 1967 War, which jeopardized the pipeline’s sustainability. “The Shortest Distance Between Two Points” uses material from TAPLine as devices to propose an alternative way of traveling the region and understand its development. The TAPLine Company was established in 1946 as a joint venture between Caltex, Esso, and Mobil. TAPLine was formed to build and operate a 1213 kilometer long, 78 centimeter wide steel tube to transport oil by land from Saudi Arabia to Lebanon, crossing the border of five political entities in a region that is very conscious of its demarcated lines. In 1983, the line could no longer sustain the pressure from layered and adjacent political interests and the company was dissolved. The infrastructure, though deteriorated through disuse and abandonment, offers a link to the present through the past. The company's imprint is the record of a rise and a fall, and the arc that binds them. Its shadow runs parallel to the shifts in the land. Stationary, rulers, tags, logos, slides, lines and the pipe itself become specters through which to address the political, geographic and social transformations in the region since the end of World War II.

Reference RT-ISO-2013-A(1-5)