Trevor Paglen Livres

This book chronicles a project intended to explain to someone--at some point in the distant future--what happened to the people who built derelict spacecraft. Artist/geographer Paglen spent four years interviewing scientists and others about the profound contradictions that characterize contemporary civilizations.

Set in a hidden world of top-level clearance, the narrative unveils a realm that operates beyond the public's awareness. The updated paperback edition introduces new material, enhancing the intrigue and depth of this secretive universe. Readers will explore the complexities and dangers of navigating through layers of classified information and the implications of such secrecy on society.

The 70 military shoulder patches presented in this book reveal a secret world of military imagery and jargon, where classified projects are known by peculiar names and illustrated with occult symbols and ridiculous cartoons. The patches are precisely photographed, hinting at a world about which little is known

Invisible: Covert Operations and Classified Landscapes is Trevor Paglen's long-awaited first photographic monograph. Social scientist, artist, writer and provocateur, Paglen has been exploring the secret activities of the U.S. military and intelligence agencies--the "black world"--for the last eight years, publishing, speaking and making astonishing photographs. As an artist, Paglen is interested in the idea of photography as truth-telling, but his pictures often stop short of traditional ideas of documentation. In the series Limit Telephotography, for example, he employs high-end optical systems to photograph top-secret governmental sites; and in The Other Night Sky, he uses the data of amateur satellite watchers to track and photograph classified spacecraft in Earth's orbit. In other works Paglen transforms documents such as passports, flight data and aliases of CIA operatives into art objects. Rebecca Solnit contributes a searing essay that traces this history of clandestine military activity on the American landscape.

This critical analysis focuses on the Autonomy Cube, a sculpture by Trevor Paglen and Jacob Appelbaum, designed for art museums, galleries, and civic spaces. The sculpture features Internet-connected computers that create an open Wi-Fi hotspot named “Autonomy Cube.” Users can connect to this network, which uniquely routes all traffic over the Tor network, facilitating anonymous browsing. Notably, at the Edith-Russ-Haus, the Cube's Tor relay functioned as an exit node, extending anonymous Internet access beyond the gallery's confines. The exhibition surrounding the artwork aimed to highlight the pervasive surveillance technology in everyday life and the public's alarming lack of awareness regarding this issue, which threatens to transform open societies into control states. In the wake of extensive surveillance revelations by powerful governments, the Autonomy Cube project rekindles the utopian ideals from the early Internet era. The book includes two newly commissioned essays that critically examine the project from various angles: art historian Dr. Luke Skrebowski contextualizes it within institutional critique, while architect Keller Easterling explores its political implications.