Prototype for a Nonfunctional Satellite

source: paglen

Developed in collaboration with aerospace engineers, the nonfunctional satellites are space-worthy sculptures designed as small, lightweight satellites that expand to become large, highly reflective structures. Placing one of these objects into low-earth orbit would create a visible “sculpture” in the night sky, visible from the earth below after sunset and before dawn as a bright, slowly moving, flickering star. The sculpture would remain in orbit for several weeks before burning up upon reentry through the atmosphere.
These designs are responses to the question of what aerospace engineering would look like if its methods were decoupled from the corporate and military interests underlying the industry. The nonfunctional satellite recasts the old question of “art for art’s sake” within a different context, asking whether we can imagine something like “aerospace engineering for aerospace engineering’s sake.”.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
source: art21org

Trevor Paglen was born in 1974 in Camp Springs, Maryland. Trained as a geographer and photographer, Paglen makes the invisible visible by documenting the American surveillance state of the 21st century. From his vantage points at various public locations he photographs distant military facilities, capturing extreme telephoto images of stealth drones. Turning his vision to the night sky, he traces the paths of information-gathering satellites. In his series of Mylar satellites, Paglen applies advanced engineering to the creation of non-functional objects, stripping technology of its intended purpose and hoping to launch his own time capsule of photographs into geostationary orbit. Tracing the ways in which the convergence of aesthetics, industrial design, and politics influence how we see and understand the world, he shows us images of the American West, originally photographed for military use and now considered examples of classic photography. In images that go beyond straightforward journalistic documentation, Paglen gives voice to shifting ideas of the landscape of the American West, humankind’s place in the cosmos, and the surveillance state.

Trevor Paglen received a BA from the University of California at Berkeley (1996), an MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (2002), and a PhD in Geography from the University of California at Berkeley (2008). He has had residencies at Artpace (2013) and MIT (2011), and his honors include a Smithsonian Artist Research Fellowship (2011); Aperture West Prize (2008); SFMoMA SECA Award (2008); Art Matters Grant (2008); and an Artadia Grant (2007). His work has appeared in major exhibitions at the Cartagena Biennial (2014); Center for Art Design and Visual Culture, Baltimore (2013); Van Abbemuseum (2013); Protocinema, Istanbul (2013); Creative Time (2012); Liverpool Biennial (2012); Guangzhou Triennial (2012); Secession, Vienna (2010); Kunsthall Oslo (2010); Kunsthalle Giessen (2010); FotoFest Biennial (2010); Istanbul Biennial (2009); Havana Biennial (2009); Berkeley Art Museum (2008); Taipei Biennial (2008); and the California College of Arts and Crafts (2002). Trevor Paglen lives and works in New York.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
source: paglen

Trevor Paglen’s work deliberately blurs lines between science, contemporary art, journalism, and other disciplines to construct unfamiliar, yet meticulously researched ways to see and interpret the world around us.
Paglen’s visual work has been exhibited at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; The Tate Modern, London; The Walker Arts Center, Minneapolis; The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; the 2008 Taipei Biennial; the 2009 Istanbul Biennial; the 2012 Liverpool Biennial, and numerous other solo and group exhibitions.
He is the author of five books and numerous articles on subjects including experimental geography, state secrecy, military symbology, photography, and visuality. His most recent book, The Last Pictures is a meditation on the intersections of deep-time, politics, and art.
Paglen has received grants and awards from the Smithsonian, Art Matters, Artadia, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the LUMA foundation, the Eyebeam Center for Art and Technology, and the Aperture Foundation.
Paglen holds a B.A. from U.C. Berkeley, an MFA from the Art Institute of Chicago, and a Ph.D. in Geography from U.C. Berkeley.
Trevor Paglen lives and works in New York.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
source: galeriezander
Protocinema (a nonprofit art organization, Istanbul and New York) presents a new work by Trevor Paglen: Prototype for a Nonfunctional Satellite (Design 4; Build 3), 2013, a 4-meter tall model for an orbital spacecraft. This work appropriates technologies normally associated with militarism and surveillance, asking them to do the opposite of their normal functions. Developed in conversation with aerospace engineers, Prototype for a Nonfunctional Satellite (Design 4; Build 3) is a sculpture designed to be placed into low-earth orbit and reflect sunlight from space down to the earth’s surface. Once launched it would appear as a bright point of light slowly moving across the sky over several months, before burning up in the atmosphere. This spacecraft-cum-art object combines maximum reflectivity with minimum weight, taking the shape of a giant mirror-like sphere.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
source: adabasini
Kulağa garip geliyor ama gerçek: Dolapdere’de bir uzay aracı duruyor! Gökten inmedi, NASA’nın bu işle hiçbir ilişkisi yok. Jodie Foster’ın ‘Contact/Mesaj’ filminde bindiği uyduyu hatırlatsa da o da değil. Amerikalı sanatçı Trevor Paglen’in ‘İşlemeyen bir Uydu için Prototip; tasarım 4, yapım 3’ adındaki bu devasa heykeli, Protocinema’nın ev sahipliğinde İstanbul ’da. Hazır yakalamışken Paglen’le gelecekte gerçekten de uzaya göndermeyi düşündüğü ‘işlevsiz uzay aracı’nı konuştuk.
Evet. (Gülüyor.) Heykel, dünyanın çemberine kolayca ve ucuzca fırlatılabilecek, uyduya uygun bir model. Devasa duran bu balonun özelliklerinden biri ise görüntüsünün yanıltıcı olması ve çökerken ince kâğıtlar şeklinde dağılması. Balonu çembere yerleştirince genişliyor; genişleyince de gece karanlığında yavaşça hareket eden, kayan bir yıldıza benziyor. Bu deney atmosferde yanana dek 1 ay sürüyor. Hiçbir askeri veya ticari amacı hedeflemeyen bu uydu, uzay mühendisliğini kullanarak yalnızca sanatsal bir bakış açısı yakalamak için yaratıldı.
Dünya’dan çok uzak ve yörüngeye bağlı olan ölü uydular temalı ‘Son Resimler’ adlı projeme hazırlanırken, birçok uzay mühendisiyle tanışma ve çalışma fırsatım oldu. Proje sürecinin en heyecan verici noktası ise mühendislerin sanatsal yaklaşımıydı. ‘İşlemeyen bir Uydu için Prototip…’te de uydunun baştan ayağa bir sanat eseri olduğunu anlatmaya çalışıyorum.
Serginiz ünlü bir sanatçının işiyle karşılaşmayı pek de beklemediğimiz bir yerde.
Heykel/uydu için bulduğumuz yeri çok seviyorum. Dolapdere’de eski bir depo ve tabii ki bir sanat galerisinden çok farklı bir mekân. O kadar virane bir yerde heykel çok daha büyülü duruyor.
Şahane! Sergi alanının seçiminden seyirciye ulaşmaya kadar her şey, sergilenecek işe özel olarak belirleniyor. Çok canlandıran ve heyecan verici, ve elbette dahil olunacak bir şey bu.
Evet, rokete koyabildiğim ve uzaya gönderebileceğim bir uydu yapmayı planlıyorum. Halen prototipler üzerinde çalışıyorum ve her tekrarlamada teknik sorunları çözüyorum. Bu uydu uzayda birkaç hafta kalacak ve sonra gökyüzünde yanıp yok olacak.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
source: paglen
Trevor Paglen’s work deliberately blurs lines between science, contemporary art, journalism, and other disciplines to construct unfamiliar, yet meticulously researched ways to see and interpret the world around us.
Paglen’s visual work has been exhibited at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; The Tate Modern, London; The Walker Arts Center, Minneapolis; The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; the 2008 Taipei Biennial; the 2009 Istanbul Biennial; the 2012 Liverpool Biennial, and numerous other solo and group exhibitions.
He is the author of five books and numerous articles on subjects including experimental geography, state secrecy, military symbology, photography, and visuality. His most recent book, The Last Pictures is a meditation on the intersections of deep-time, politics, and art. Paglen has received grants and awards from the Smithsonian, Art Matters, Artadia, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the LUMA foundation, the Eyebeam Center for Art and Technology, and the Aperture Foundation. Paglen holds a B.A. from U.C. Berkeley, an MFA from the Art Institute of Chicago, and a Ph.D. in Geography from U.C. Berkeley. Trevor Paglen lives and works in New York.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
source: gaite-lyrique
Passionné de géographie, Trevor Paglen ne se cantonne pas à manipuler des cartes. Il est plutôt du genre à enfiler des chaussures de rando pour partir expérimenter les territoires avec dans son sac à dos des livres de types qui ont pensés les espaces physiques et mentaux au XXème siècle comme Lefebvre ou Benjamin. En effet, ses recherches sur les interactions entre architectures spatiales et infrastructures émotionnelles l’ont conduit dans les terres arides de l’ouest américain, là ou presque rien ne pousse. Presque.
« Dans les années 1990, je menais de nombreux projets artistiques sur le thème du système pénitentiaire. Je m’intéressais tout particulièrement au lien entre l’emplacement géographique des prisons et la façon dont elles sont perçues par les individus. De nombreuses prisons américaines, en particulier en Californie, sont très profondément enfoncées dans le désert, loin, très loin du reste du monde. »
L’implantation de super-prisons en zones inhospitalières accroît l’isolement des reclus en les rejetant littéralement hors des villes ; sans droit de cité ni de visibilité. Le territoire est aménagé pour séparer et punir, selon l’expression qui titre la récente thèse d’Olivier Milhaud, elle-même inspirée de Foucault. Dissimulés loin des regards par des kilomètres de néant, ces taules ne se donnent pas non plus facilement à voir quand on se trouve à leurs abords ; mêne quand l’œil, à demi clos par les picotements du sable et de la chaleur, s’est habitué aux ondulations du paysage bouillant. Pour observer ces structures, Trevor Paglen s’est lancé dans l’étude de photographies aériennes. Au cours de son investigation, il se rend compte que les no man’s land de l’ouest n’abritent pas uniquement ceux qui constituent une menace pour la société américaine : ceux qui sont censés assurer sa protection s’y cachent aussi.