Today, the images we encounter no longer invite reflection but overwhelm us, offering no clear path to meaning. We can no longer grasp the reality we inhabit, and the effort to understand has long since faded. We live in a society exhausted not only by its images, but by the weight of its own history.
My work engages with this exhaustion, and documents a society adrift, mirroring its weariness. It seeks to capture the malaises, the palliatives, the withdrawals, and the compensatory fantasies of this society, along with its symbols and omens. It draws attention to the images of helplessness that have become seductive, images that both paralyze and mesmerize. These are the stupefying images of an empire, numbed and disoriented by its own reflection, indifferent to whether what it sees is real or imagined.
My images invite viewers to reflect on what it means to witness, to remember, and to forget in an age where the present has become unintelligible, and the future unthinkable. In embracing the fractured and ambiguous, my work prompt viewers to reconsider the act of seeing itself—what it means to witness without understanding, to remember without clarity. Rather than imposing order or narrative, I aim to mirror the disorientations and disintegrations of our age, creating images that embody the paradox of living in a world simultaneously saturated with, and numbed by, its own representation.
Artist Biography
Tomash Dabrowski is a photographer based in Chicago, Illinois. He completed his PhD at Northwestern University, where his research focused on the intersections of history, power, and representation. His creative work explores the malaises of late capitalism, engaging with themes of social exhaustion and disorientation. Dabrowski’s work blends intellectual inquiry with visual storytelling, inviting viewers to reflect on the act of witnessing, remembering, and forgetting. His work has been published in Philosophy and Social Criticism, the Blackwell Encyclopedia of Political Thought, and elsewhere.
