Paolo Cirio, known for his critical investigations into the intersections between technology, power, surveillance and society, will give a lecture on 27 June 2026 at the IMPAKT Centre for Media Culture in Utrecht, the international platform dedicated to media art and a partner of EMAP – the European Media Art Platform, one of Europe’s leading organisations bringing together festivals, cultural institutions and artists, for which Cirio is one of the artists-in-residence in 2026. On this occasion, the activist will present the main strands of his work and reflect on how artistic practice can reveal the hidden power structures within digital societies and open them up to public discussion.
His projects combine research, video essays, data visualisation, and public interventions, addressing issues ranging from corporate data extraction to state surveillance and the online manipulation of information.
Through urgent questions about our networked society, Cirio examines who controls data, how people are monitored and influenced, and what role artistic intervention can play in challenging these systems. He will also offer a brief insight into the research he is developing during his residency at IMPAKT, including early reflections on post-quantum cryptography and the future of digital security.
Paolo Cirio is an artist and hacktivist whose practice investigates, exposes, and subverts the data systems and infrastructures underpinning contemporary power. Working at the intersections of art, technology, and activism, his projects often transform evidence of systemic exploitation into the basis for creative regulatory advocacy. Cirio’s methods—including hacking, piracy, data leaks, identity theft, and cyberattacks—have provoked international debate and resulted in numerous legal threats. He is known for large-scale interventions such as exposing over 200,000 Cayman Islands offshore firms, publishing 1 million Facebook users on a fabricated dating platform, leaking 60,000 financial news articles and pirated e-books from Amazon, and obfuscating 15 million U.S. criminal records. Other projects have included the exposure of 20,000 patents related to technologies of social manipulation, the piracy of 100,000 Sotheby’s auction records, and an attempt to profile 4,000 French police officers through facial recognition. His early works targeted NATO, with cyberattacks and reports on its military operations since 2001. Cirio’s work has been exhibited internationally at institutions including Centre Pompidou (Paris), Tate Modern (London), Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo (Turin), and ZKM Center for Art and Media (Karlsruhe), as well as at festivals such as transmediale (Berlin) and Ars Electronica (Linz). He has received numerous awards, among them the Golden Nica, first prize at Ars Electronica (2014), second prize at transmediale (2006), an Eyebeam Fellowship (2012), and an NEA grant at ISCP, New York (2017).
Paolo Cirio (EMAP 2026’s resident), Art & Activism on Tech-Authoritarianism, conference
IMPAKT for Media Culture, Utrecht, June 27, 2026, 7.30 – 9.30 p.m.
Visit here the website to reserve a ticket
Read the interview with Mita Medri that anticipates the conference
