Trevor Paglen Quotes

Powerful Trevor Paglen for Daily Growth

About Trevor Paglen

Trevor Paglen (born 1974) is an American artist, geographer, and investigator who works at the intersection of art, science, and politics. His pioneering work focuses on surveillance, secret operations, and military culture, making him a leading figure in the field of experimental geography. Born in St. Louis, Missouri, Paglen was raised primarily in Sacramento, California. He attended the University of California, Berkeley where he earned a Bachelor's degree in science and later received his Master's in science from the School of Visual Arts in New York. His unique interdisciplinary background has significantly influenced his artistic approach. Paglen's career began in the early 2000s with photographic series like "The Other Night Sky" (2003), where he captured images of classified and covert military bases disguised as stars in the night sky using long-exposure photography. His work has since expanded to include large-scale installations, investigative journalism, and public lectures. One of his most notable works is "The Last Pictures" (2012), a set of images selected by Paglen that were etched onto a microchip and launched into space aboard the Landsat 7 satellite. The images aim to serve as a time capsule for extraterrestrial civilizations, documenting modern human life and culture. In 2019, Paglen co-authored "Blank Spots on the Map: The Quest to Fill in the World" with journalist and geographer Jennifer Bussell. This book examines the history of hidden spaces and the people who risk their lives to reveal them, further highlighting his dedication to uncovering the truth behind secretive operations. Paglen's work has been exhibited at institutions such as the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Smithsonian American Art Museum, and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. His contributions to contemporary art and investigative journalism continue to inspire and provoke thought about the role of surveillance, secrecy, and power in modern society.

Interpretations of Popular Quotes

"If you want to understand how the world works, don't just look at what it is, but also at what it does."

This quote emphasizes the importance of observing not only the characteristics or appearances of things in the world, but also their actions, behaviors, and impacts. Understanding the dynamics and functions of the world requires a holistic approach that considers both its intrinsic qualities and its extrinsic effects on other systems and entities. Essentially, it encourages us to look beyond the surface level and delve deeper into the mechanisms and processes that shape our reality.

"Surveillance is the business model of the Internet."

Trevor Paglen's quote underscores the fundamental economic structure of the internet, suggesting that the primary means through which online services are financed and maintained is by collecting and analyzing user data for targeted advertising and other purposes. In essence, it emphasizes the pervasive role of surveillance as a cornerstone in the digital ecosystem, often at the expense of individual privacy and autonomy.

"The future will not be shaped by those who simply see. It will be shaped by those who see and understand."

This quote emphasizes that merely observing or perceiving the world is not enough to shape the future; one must also comprehend what they see. Understanding involves critical thinking, analysis, and interpretation of the observed phenomena, allowing individuals to make informed decisions and create meaningful change. In essence, Trevor Paglen's quote underscores the importance of active engagement with the world, rather than passive observation, for driving progress and shaping our collective future.

"Art is a powerful tool for understanding and interpreting our world."

This quote emphasizes that art, in its various forms, plays a crucial role in helping us grasp and make sense of the world around us. It's more than just a form of aesthetic expression; it serves as a lens through which we can observe, reflect upon, and interpret complex realities. Art stimulates our imagination, fosters critical thinking, and encourages empathy by inviting us to engage with diverse perspectives. In essence, Trevor Paglen is suggesting that art has the unique ability to help us comprehend our world in ways traditional means may not reach.

"We are surrounded by networks that see, listen, and know us, but we don't see the networks themselves."

Trevor Paglen's quote highlights our increasing dependence on technology without fully comprehending its vast implications. In essence, he suggests that while we are constantly observed and tracked by digital networks through various devices (such as cameras, microphones, and sensors), we often overlook or misunderstand the scope of these systems themselves. This raises concerns about privacy, data security, and the control over our own information in an era of widespread data collection and artificial intelligence. Understanding and engaging with the "invisible" networks around us is essential for maintaining a balance between technology's benefits and potential risks to individual freedom and societal values.

Do cave paintings mean anything? Not really, but I, for one, am happy to have them.

- Trevor Paglen

Happy, Cave, Mean, Paintings

Looking out at the photographic landscape that surrounds us - the world of images and image-making that we inhabit - it seems obvious that photography has undergone dramatic changes in its technical, cultural, and critical composition.

- Trevor Paglen

Critical, Technical, Images, Undergone

In the very near future, I guarantee that the pictures you post on social media will affect your credit rating, health and auto insurance policies, and much more. It will all happen automatically. In a very real way, our rights and freedoms will be modulated by our metadata signatures. What's at stake, obviously, is the future of the human race!

- Trevor Paglen

Insurance, Very, Auto, Automatically

Before Christianity became the Roman Empire's official religion in the 4th Century, 'mystery religions,' organized around a central canon of secret knowledge, were widespread. Membership in such religions was limited to people who had passed through secret initiation rituals and had begun to learn a body of hidden knowledge.

- Trevor Paglen

Through, Hidden, Became, Canon

Creating artworks, writing and publishing novels, poetry, music, or conducting art-historical research requires support. So does everything else in the world, from physics to fish and wildlife management to human-rights advocacy.

- Trevor Paglen

Music, Research, Conducting, Advocacy

I believe that art can make relevant and progressive contributions to culture and society.

- Trevor Paglen

Art, Society, Relevant, Progressive

It's common knowledge that most of the guys at Guantanamo are nobodies. Many were turned in by bounty hunters.

- Trevor Paglen

Hunters, Turned, Many, Bounty

I always start with the assumption that everything that happens in the world is actually in the world. It sounds like an obvious thing to say, but it's a very powerful methodological premise.

- Trevor Paglen

Always, Like, Very, Premise

We know that, immediately after 9/11, the CIA set up a program to collaborate with 80 foreign countries to varying degrees. The CIA also started funding other intelligence services in order to use them as proxies. We also know that some of these collaborations were kept off the record; supposedly, there is no paper trail.

- Trevor Paglen

Some, Other, Supposedly, Collaborate

I think of AI itself as a monster of capitalism.

- Trevor Paglen

Think, I Think, Itself, AI

Photographs don't 'reveal' much at all but instead help us generate a kind of visual vocabulary that we can use to make sense of the world and direct our attention to certain things around us. In other words, they help us learn how to see.

- Trevor Paglen

Other, Reveal, Use, Generate

I think that some of the earliest ideas in the modern period were actually from astronomy. You look at Galileo: He goes up and points his telescope up at Jupiter and finds out, hey, Jupiter has these moons.

- Trevor Paglen

Some, Jupiter, I Think, Galileo

I wanted to make an artwork that really underlined the contradiction between how machines see and how humans see. Because music is so affective and is just as corporeal as it is cerebral, I thought coupling a music performance with machine vision adds up to something that work on an emotional, aesthetic, and intellectual level.

- Trevor Paglen

Thought, Aesthetic, How, Affective

For millennia, artists and mystics have pondered the question of how to represent that which, by definition, cannot or must not be represented.

- Trevor Paglen

Question, How, Which, Millennia

The Internet was supposed to be the greatest tool of global communications and means of sharing knowledge in human history. And it is. But it has also become the most effective instrument of mass surveillance and potentially one of the greatest instruments of totalitarianism in the history of the world.

- Trevor Paglen

Mass, Global, The History Of, Human History

The U.S. space program has mythologies attached to pioneering and conquering, but the Russian tradition is very different. In the Russian tradition, the ultimate goal of humanity was to resurrect all humans.

- Trevor Paglen

Goal, Ultimate Goal, Very, Space Program

Digital surveillance programs require concrete data centres; intelligence agencies are based in real buildings. Surveillance systems ultimately consist of technologies, people, and the vast network of material resources that supports them.

- Trevor Paglen

Data, Concrete, Consist, Supports

I think the automation of vision is a much bigger deal than the invention of perspective.

- Trevor Paglen

Vision, Think, Deal, Invention

What I thought was fascinating about comparative religion was that these were the stories that humans have told themselves about where they come from, who they are and where they're going, and what it means to be alive on the planet.

- Trevor Paglen

Thought, Stories, Means, Comparative

Art is more than a series of images that are disembodied. Art is objects that live in real places, economies, spaces, architecture.

- Trevor Paglen

Art, More, Images, Spaces

Oftentimes, secrecy involves creating spaces that are outside of the law but are outside the normal channels of oversight. And I think it's pretty easy to see that if you create spaces that are essentially outside the law, then you're creating spaces where anything can happen.

- Trevor Paglen

See, Anything, I Think, Spaces

I really don't think art is good at answering questions. It's much better at posing questions - and even better at simply asking people to open their eyes.

- Trevor Paglen

Art, Think, Asking, Answering

Much of the way we understand the world is through images. That's what I think good art does - it teaches you how to see the historical moment that you live in.

- Trevor Paglen

Think, Through, Images, Good Art

How has the sky been transformed by drones? How has the ocean been transformed by the fact that over 90% of the world's information travels in underwater cables?

- Trevor Paglen

Sky, Over, Been, Transformed

When people understand that they are constantly monitored, they are more conformist - they are less willing to take up controversial positions - and that kind of mass conformity is incompatible with democracy.

- Trevor Paglen

Kind, More, Willing, Controversial

American intelligence and military agencies have a huge footprint in terms of how the world works, but they're largely invisible. I'm interested in exploring those 'geographies' of secrecy from many different angles: political, legal, economic, spatial, etc., because I am fundamentally just interested in how the world works and how societies work.

- Trevor Paglen

Invisible, Angles, Works, Footprint

One project I am pretty excited about is 'Autonomy Cube.' These are basically minimalist sculptures that create a free and open Wi-Fi network wherever you install them, and they are routed over Tor, which basically anonymizes the traffic of everybody using it.

- Trevor Paglen

Everybody, About, Sculptures, Minimalist

Perhaps 'photography' has become so all-pervasive that it no longer makes sense to think about it as a discreet practice or field of inquiry. In other words, perhaps 'photography,' as a meaningful cultural trope, is over.

- Trevor Paglen

Practice, Think, Over, Discreet

What started happening really quickly after 9/11 and the construction of this 'War on Terror' business is that I saw all kinds of parallels between the way that was being constructed and the way that prisons had been constructed since the early 1980s.

- Trevor Paglen

Been, Quickly, Kinds, Prisons

The most famous secret base, I guess, would be Area 51, which a lot of people have heard of as a kind of mythical place. Well, it's a real place.

- Trevor Paglen

Famous, Area, Which, Base

Religions have always adopted rich symbolic languages to signify the different aspects of their respective forms of faith and mythology.

- Trevor Paglen

Always, Symbolic, Languages, Forms

What would the infrastructure of the Internet look like if mass surveillance wasn't its business model?

- Trevor Paglen

Business, Like, Would, Surveillance

Seeing various aspects of the secret state and surveillance state echoes a long tradition in art of looking at the sublime.

- Trevor Paglen

Art, Secret, Aspects, Surveillance

I want to help develop a visual and cultural vocabulary around surveillance.

- Trevor Paglen

Help, Cultural, Vocabulary, Surveillance

I think mass surveillance is a bad idea because a surveillance society is one in which people understand that they are constantly monitored.

- Trevor Paglen

Think, I Think, Which, Surveillance

In a democracy, the citizens are supposed to have all the power, and the government is supposed to be the means by which the citizens exercise that power. But when you have a surveillance state, the state has all the power, and citizens have very little.

- Trevor Paglen

Very, Which, Means, Surveillance

We didn't have to use technology to build a surveillance state.

- Trevor Paglen

Technology, Build, Use, Surveillance

Although the organizing logic of our nation's surveillance apparatus is invisibility and secrecy, its operations occupy the physical world.

- Trevor Paglen

Nation, Occupy, Apparatus, Surveillance

We humans have always looked to the sky as a sounding board for asking big questions about ourselves: Who are we? Where did we come from? Where are we going?

- Trevor Paglen

Sky, Big, Always, Board

In the traditional academic literature, secrecy is thought of as a set of bureaucratic operations - hiding files and hiding information, that sort of thing.

- Trevor Paglen

Thought, Set, Sort, Bureaucratic

If secrecy is made out of the same stuff that the rest of the world is made out of, then it's fundamentally visible, which means that secrecy can only fail in the first instance, in the sense that you cannot make something disappear.

- Trevor Paglen

Disappear, Out, Instance, Same Stuff

Artists have historically understood images better than anyone else. This is what we do.

- Trevor Paglen

Better, Artists, Images, Understood

Engineers working in the 'black world' of classified military projects are often referred to in military circles as 'black hats.' There are a lot of jokes about the difference between 'white hats' and their spooky counterparts.

- Trevor Paglen

Black, Hats, Projects, Jokes

We imagine going to the moon and planting a flag, going to an asteroid and mining, going to Mars and setting up a colony. And I think that expansionist mentality is very self-destructive, especially given the kind of precarious relationship we now have to the ecosystem here on Earth, because it allows us to imagine that Earth is disposable.

- Trevor Paglen

Here, Very, Self-Destructive, Precarious

If you are a plane-spotter, and you are interested in the history of a particular aircraft, you know there are many documents publicly available: registration papers and airworthiness certificates from the FAA. You can also get flight data from the FAA.

- Trevor Paglen

Data, Flight, Documents, Registration

For me, there's something very romantic about going and looking at the stars and trying to photograph spy satellites.

- Trevor Paglen

Going, Very, Satellites, Spy

Once, I got lost in the middle of the desert and had to follow the North Star to find the dirt road where my truck was parked a few miles away. Another time, I got stuck in quicksand for two days.

- Trevor Paglen

Truck, Away, North, Quicksand

Traditionally, images have functioned as representations of something in the world, but we are quickly approaching the point where vast majority of images are produced for other machines, and no human being will ever see them.

- Trevor Paglen

Other, Human Being, Images, Machines

Anything humans can do in space, robots can do better.

- Trevor Paglen

Space, Better, Humans, Robots

Once you start looking into the infrastructure, it becomes obvious very quickly that 99 percent of the world's information goes through little tubes under the ocean. Those are very juicy targets for someone who wants to surveil the world.

- Trevor Paglen

Through, Very, Quickly, Targets

In the late 19th century, Russian Cosmists such as Nikolai Fyodorov believed we need to go to space to collect all the particles of all the people who had ever lived. Cosmism says going into space is going into the past.

- Trevor Paglen

Space, Had, 19th Century, Collect

It's not okay for me to behave as if I'm cynical about the future. Even if I am.

- Trevor Paglen

Okay, About, Am, Cynical

Civilian law around aviation is much looser than those governing military. Civilian planes can basically fly wherever they want in the world.

- Trevor Paglen

Law, Want, Planes, Wherever

When you look at the number of satellites, what they're doing and what they represent, it is really a vision of trying to have the world in your clutches.

- Trevor Paglen

Doing, Your, Satellites, Represent

In religion, symbols have always played a iconographic and ritualistic role. Different symbols might represent different theological ideas.

- Trevor Paglen

Always, Role, Might, Represent

On one hand, the idea of sending pictures off into the vastness of space and time seems nonsensical. On the other, I felt like the gesture carried an enormous amount of responsibility.

- Trevor Paglen

Other, Carried, Amount, Space And Time

If I was a CIA front company, what would I want to be able to do? Well, I would want to be able to land at military airfields as a civilian, so there's got to be some document that the Air Force or the Army has that would list all the civilian aircraft that are cleared to land at military bases.

- Trevor Paglen

Some, Air, Document, CIA

Photography has become so fundamental to the way we see that 'photography' and 'seeing' are becoming more and more synonymous. The ubiquity of photography is, perhaps ironically, a challenge to curators, practitioners, and critics.

- Trevor Paglen

More, Becoming, Fundamental, Synonymous

I think that a lot of us subconsciously would like to live in a world in which good things were beautiful and bad things were ugly. But that's not how the world works.

- Trevor Paglen

Think, I Think, Which, Good Things

Infrastructures of power always inhabit the surface of the earth somehow, or the skies above the earth. They're material things, always, and even though the metaphors we use to describe them are often immaterial - for example, we might describe the Internet as the Cloud or cyberspace - those metaphors are wildly misleading.

- Trevor Paglen

Cloud, Material Things, Use, Cyberspace

Images can make realities out of people and struggles - the reality we give them. Images really matter.

- Trevor Paglen

Reality, Give, Images, Struggles

When we look at something that is alien to us, that is beyond our comprehension, what do we see but ourselves?

- Trevor Paglen

Look, Beyond, See, Comprehension

Every person who went into the space industry did so because they looked up at the sky and were fascinated by it - not because they wanted to make a military or commercial object.

- Trevor Paglen

Sky, Commercial, Looked, Object

Technologically, it is not hard to launch an object into space. Emotionally, it has been difficult.

- Trevor Paglen

Launch, Difficult, Been, Object

I don't feel it incumbent on me to make sense of everything.

- Trevor Paglen

Me, Feel, Sense, Incumbent

The dragon is a very consistent symbol of secret satellite iconography and signals intelligence satellites.

- Trevor Paglen

Very, Satellites, Symbol, Satellite

Many of the things that shape the way the world looks are, quite frankly, invisible.

- Trevor Paglen

World, Looks, Frankly, Quite Frankly

One of the kinds of things I'm consistently interested in is what the border between the seen and not seen is and the border between being able to perceive something and not perceive it.

- Trevor Paglen

Border, Being, Kinds, Consistently

At extreme distances, there is essentially no such thing as depth of field.

- Trevor Paglen

Field, Depth, Distances, Extreme

My dad was not one of these stereotypical military people - buzz-cut, rah-rah-rah.

- Trevor Paglen

People, Military, Dad, Stereotypical

'The Last Pictures' is meant to create a framework to think about the long-term effects of human civilizations and the transformations we've made to the world around us. Having said that, every person in the world would have done the project differently, so in that sense, I guess it bears my creative stamp.

- Trevor Paglen

Project, Stamp, About, Bears

I think that one of the most important things that art can do is give you a reason to look at something, almost give you permission to look at something.

- Trevor Paglen

Think, Reason, Give, Permission

The dead spacecraft in orbit have become a permanent fixture around our planet, not unlike the rings of Saturn. They will be the longest-lasting artifacts of human civilization, quietly circling the Earth until the sun turns into a red giant about 5 billion years from now.

- Trevor Paglen

Civilization, Saturn, About, Our Planet

I don't put work in an art gallery because the next day I want people to march in the streets.

- Trevor Paglen

Art, Next, Streets, March

I pretty much made a conscious decision to make projects a lot of people can relate to.

- Trevor Paglen

Pretty, Projects, Lot, Conscious

To me, traditional approaches to doing photography and thinking about photography feel increasingly anachronistic.

- Trevor Paglen

Increasingly, Traditional, Approaches

If we look in the right places at the right times, we can begin to glimpse America's vast intelligence infrastructure.

- Trevor Paglen

Places, Glimpse, Times, Vast

It's productive and fun to try interpreting cave paintings, but ultimately, they can't teach us anything beyond what we imagine them to be.

- Trevor Paglen

Cave, Imagine, Interpreting, Productive

Creative projects are rarely the result of a single person's efforts.

- Trevor Paglen

Single, Result, Efforts, Rarely

I have to admit that I'm not very good with grammar. They taught grammar in elementary and high school, but I went to public schools, so I never really learned it.

- Trevor Paglen

Good, Very, Learned, Elementary

Show me what society that ever existed that did not use the tools that they had available. Ask any person from East Germany... you will never hear somebody say, 'The Stasi never bothered me because I didn't have anything to hide.' That's not a thing that people say.

- Trevor Paglen

Show, Use, Germany, Bothered

I would argue that racism, for example, is a feature of machine learning - it's not a bug.

- Trevor Paglen

Racism, For Example, Would, Bug

Geosynchronous spacecraft will be among civilization's most enduring remnants, quietly circling Earth until the Earth is no more.

- Trevor Paglen

Civilization, Will, More, Enduring

I can't imagine anything more beautiful on this planet than looking up at the stars and seeing a kind of artificial star moving through the night sky.

- Trevor Paglen

Sky, Through, Imagine, Moving

Nothing that you make in the world exists in isolation from the social and political and ecological dimensions of it.

- Trevor Paglen

World, Social, Ecological, Exists

It was a very strange time in the late 1950s/early 1960s, when people were putting things in space, but that language of spacecraft hadn't really congealed yet. A lot of artists at that time were looking at them as aesthetic objects.

- Trevor Paglen

Aesthetic, Very, Putting, Spacecraft

I would say that the fundamental question of geography is about how humans shaped the Earth's surface and how we, in turn, are shaped by the ways in which we have shaped the Earth's surface. So, for me, geography was just a set of tools that allowed me to ask these kinds of questions and to try to think through them.

- Trevor Paglen

Through, Shaped, Allowed, Humans

I think of my visual work as an exploration of political epistemology: the politics of how we know what we think we know.

- Trevor Paglen

Politics, Think, How, Epistemology

The NRO is like a secret twin to NASA. It's the U.S.' 'other' space agency. The agency is about as old as NASA, but its existence was secret until 1992.

- Trevor Paglen

Old, Other, Like, Agency

What I'm trying to do is to get a glimpse into the secret state that surrounds us all the time but that we have not trained ourselves to see very well.

- Trevor Paglen

Secret, Very, Trained, Glimpse

In human geography, we think about landscapes as being political, social, cultural, economic, and physical things all at the same time. And that's the way that I wanted to approach the question of state secrecy.

- Trevor Paglen

Think, Question, Social, Landscapes

People like to say that my work is about making the invisible visible, but that's a misunderstanding. It's about showing what invisibility looks like.

- Trevor Paglen

Making, Like, Visible, Misunderstanding

When we look up into the starry night sky, we tend to see reflections of ourselves.

- Trevor Paglen

Sky, See, Tend, Starry

I am not a journalist or an academic.

- Trevor Paglen

I Am, Academic, Am, Journalist

For me, one of the jobs of an artist is to try to see changes taking place.

- Trevor Paglen

Artist, See, Jobs, Changes

Injustice drives me crazy!

- Trevor Paglen

Crazy, Me, Injustice, Drives

The world is constantly changing, and I feel like my job is to try to see how it is changing.

- Trevor Paglen

Feel, Like, I Feel, Changing

Image-making, along with storytelling and music, is the stuff that culture is made out of.

- Trevor Paglen

Music, Culture, Along, Storytelling

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