eyes on: Trevor Paglen

TREVOR PAGLEN
November 26, 2010 - February 13, 2011

Trevor Paglen’s works offer complex cartographies of US military policy. Using extensive series of photographs, often in large format, he reveals military machinations that are kept hidden from public view.

Paglen often uses sophisticated technology including special cameras and high-precision telescopes developed for space photography with focal lengths of up to 7000 mm–for example to take pictures from great distances of isolated military facilities in the deserts of the United States. For one of his latest works, The Other Night Sky, he used long exposure to document 189 orbiting satellites that make up a network used by the CIA for seamless global surveillance.

His works are preceded by meticulous observation, research, and data gathering. As well as the use of advanced photographic techniques and the programming of software to obtain data, his working methods include exchanging information with international networks of amateurs such as aircraft and satellite spotters. Such observers were instrumental in uncovering the secret air transfers (extraordinary rendition flights) to destinations including Guantánamo Bay, which brought prisoners to sites outside the United States for interrogation and torture. Paglen was one of the first artists to document these flights, recording his findings in his book Torture Taxi (published with A.C. Thompson, 2006).