Trevor Paglen

Trevor Paglen is an artist, writer, and experimental geographer. His work involves deliberately blurring the lines between social science, contemporary art, and a host of even more obscure disciplines to construct unfamiliar, yet meticulously researched ways to interpret the world around us.

Paglen's visual work has been exhibited at Transmediale.08 Festival, Berlin; The Andy Warhol Museum, Pittsburgh; Institute of Contemporary Art, Philadelphia; Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, San Francisco; Kunstraum Muenchen, Munich; Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art, North Adams; the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; and numerous other venues. His work has been featured in numerous publications including The New York Times, Wired, Newsweek, Modern Painters, Aperture, and Art Forum.

Paglen has received grants and commissions from Rhizome.org, Art Matters, Artadia, and the Eyebeam Center for Art and Technology.

Paglen is the author of three books. His first book, Torture Taxi: On the Trail of the CIA's Rendition Flights (co-authored with AC Thompson; Melville House, 2006) was the first book to systematically describe the CIA's «extraordinary rendition» program. His second book, I Could Tell You But Then You Would Have to be Destroyed by Me (Melville House, 2007) an examination of the visual culture of «black» military programs, was published in Spring 2008. His third book, Blank Spots on a Map, was published by Dutton/Penguin in early 2009.

Paglen holds a B.A. from UC Berkeley, an M.F.A. from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, and a Ph.D. in Geography from UC Berkeley.

Paglen lives and works in Oakland, CA.