Pouring Water on Troubled Oil: Dylan Thomas in Iran, a new exhibition at the Dylan Thomas Centre, explores a little-known episode in the life of Dylan Thomas: his journey through Iran in 1951 at a pivotal moment in the history of Britain and Iran. Commissioned by the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company (now BP) to write a publicity film, Thomas travelled from the capital Tehran to the oil city of Abadan, home to the largest oil refinery in the world at the time. His visit took place against the backdrop of growing industrial unrest and the Iranian oil nationalisation movement, which challenged British control over one of the world's most strategically important energy resources.
Developed from the research underpinning filmmaker Nariman Massoumi’s documentary Pouring Water on Troubled Oil (2023), the exhibition, co-curated by Massoumi and Jo Furber, lead curator of the Dylan Thomas Centre, brings together rare archival documents, photographs, letters, notebooks, films and publications to trace Thomas’s journey through Iran and examine his complex response to the assignment. Drawing on materials from the National Library of Wales, the Harry Ransom Center, BP Archives, the BBC Written Archives Centre and The National Archives, it offers an unprecedented insight into the poet’s encounters with the oil industry, British expatriate communities and Iranian society at a moment of profound political change.
At the centre of the exhibition is Massoumi’s 26-minute poetic documentary Pouring Water on Troubled Oil, which reimagines Thomas’s journey through archival photographs, letters and documents, some of which are displayed in the exhibition itself. Combining rare oil company photographs with Thomas’s own lyrical reflections (voiced by actor Michael Sheen), the film explores Thomas’s haunting encounter with oil and colonialism during a period of intense political upheaval.
The exhibition also premieres a rare film interview with the acclaimed Iranian writer, intellectual and pioneering filmmaker Ebrahim Golestan, one of the founding figures of Iranian arthouse cinema. Recorded in Sussex in 2017, before his death in 2023, the interview captures Golestan’s recollections of meeting Thomas in Abadan during his visit to Iran and provides a first-hand account of an extraordinary encounter between the two great artists. Visitors can also view Golestan’s published memoir of the meeting, translated into English in 2022 and listen to an edited audio interview with teacher and writer Olive Suratgar, who also met Thomas during his trip.
The archival displays reveal how Thomas’s commission emerged from his substantial but often overlooked career as a film scriptwriter. Original scripts, production documents and publications demonstrate the skills that led to his recruitment for what officials described as “one of the most important publicity projects ever undertaken” by the oil company. At the centre of the display are the surviving materials relating to the proposed film and eventual film Persian Story (1952), including the original treatment supplied to Thomas, company correspondence and photographs published in the oil company’s magazine Naft. Together, these documents expose the colonial assumptions embedded within the project, presenting oil extraction as a force for progress while portraying Iran as backward and exotic.
A rich collection of personal writings illuminates Thomas’s experience of Iran. Letters written to his wife Caitlin Thomas, the American writer Pearl Kazin and his literary associate Oscar Williams reveal both his impressions of the country and the turbulence of his personal life. One letter contains the phrase that gives the exhibition its title, where Thomas sarcastically describes his role as helping to “pour water on troubled oil”. Visitors can also view Thomas’s notebook containing observations from Tehran, alongside a striking photograph of him taking a break on a remote roadside during his journey through the country.
Although Thomas never completed the commissioned film script, his experiences resulted in the BBC radio broadcast Persian Oil, transmitted in April 1951. Annotated broadcast scripts and government documents reveal how his observations were edited by BBC producers to remove a harrowing depiction of child destitution during his visit to a hospital.
The exhibition further explores the historical connections between Wales and Iran forged through oil. Crude oil extracted and refined in Abadan was shipped to Swansea and processed at Llandarcy, Britain’s first oil refinery, located less than ten miles from Thomas’s birthplace. Through photographs and a newspaper report, visitors are invited to consider how Welsh industrial history was deeply embedded in histories of oil and colonialism. Displays relating to the Atlantic Duchess tanker explosion in Swansea in 1951 and photographs of oil infrastructure and workers reveal the human labour and risks that underpinned the oil industry.
By situating Thomas’s journey within this wider history, Pouring Water on Troubled Oil: Dylan Thomas in Iran offers a fresh perspective on one of Wales’s most celebrated writers at a key historical moment, while illuminating the overlooked connections between Wales and Iran.