Trevor Paglen’s latest exhibition ‘Cardinals’ blurs the line between documentary evidence and artistic fabrication, serving as a timely exploration of perception, belief, and the power of visual information.
Taken over two decades, 22 images depict what appear to be UFOs against dramatic Western landscapes. This show continues Paglen’s career-long investigation into the hidden systems that shape our world, this time focusing on the enigmatic realm of UFO culture and conspiracy theories.
Paglen’s work taps into what historian Richard Hofstadter termed “The Paranoid Style in American Politics,” a recurring theme in American culture characterized by elaborate conspiracy theories and a belief in hidden malevolent forces.
The exhibition’s title refers to an alleged Air Force code name for unidentified aerial phenomena, as revealed in the accompanying video piece ‘Doty’ (2023). This 66-minute black-and-white video features Richard Doty, a former Air Force counterintelligence officer, calmly recounting his alleged involvement with government UFO projects.
Doty’s matter-of-fact delivery of outlandish claims mirrors the way disinformation often spreads in our current media landscape – through confident assertions that play on existing beliefs and biases.
Paglen’s photographs fall into two distinct categories, creating a fascinating visual dialogue.
Large-scale, meticulously composed landscapes reminiscent of Ansel Adams are subtly subverted by the inclusion of small flying saucers. These UFOs are modeled after famous hoax photographs from the 1960s, injecting an element of the surreal into otherwise straightforward imagery.
In contrast, smaller prints mimic the flat, amateurish quality of tabloid UFO “evidence,” despite being produced using high-end photographic techniques.
This juxtaposition challenges viewers to question their assumptions about what constitutes reliable visual evidence. Paglen’s work embraces this ambiguity, encouraging critical engagement with visual information in an age of deepfakes and AI-generated content.
Paglen’s work serves as a reminder that even seemingly objective forms of documentation, like photography, can be manipulated to serve various agendas. The ability to critically evaluate sources and question the authenticity of content has become an essential skill for navigating the modern information ecosystem.
‘Cardinals’ not only engages with the past but also points toward the future, asking us to consider how we will make sense of a world where seeing is no longer believing.