In Est et non est, Paweł Żak presents an artistic vision of heaven that transcends its everyday perception as merely the sky above. This poetic photobook is built around a conceptual approach to heaven, embracing its dual meaning as both a boundless physical expanse and a metaphysical realm traditionally associated with the divine.

Drawing on memories of childhood wonder – naïve attempts to reach heaven with snowballs or to glimpse God by looking upward – the artist contrasts those early imaginings with his present-day gaze. The book becomes a meditation on how belief, longing and uncertainty shape our understanding of what lies beyond.

While photography is often seen as a mirror of reality, the artist disrupts this assumption through deliberate, material interventions in his images. These subtle distortions question not only the nature of the photographed subject but also the very act of seeing, turning each image into a tactile fragment of memory and doubt.

In Est et non est, heaven is no longer a distant place but an internal experience, fleetingly accessible and always elusive. Żak’s work offers a deeply personal yet universal reflection on the fragility of perception and the power of images to both reveal and obscure what we hope to find.

In Est et non est, Paweł Żak looks towards heaven - not simply as the sky above us, but as a place suspended between what we believe, what we remember and what we can never fully know.

The starting point is childhood: the naïve conviction that heaven might be reached with a snowball, or that God might reveal himself if only we looked upwards for long enough. Years later, Żak returns to that same direction of gaze, but with a very different kind of certainty. His photographs move between the tangible and the imagined, between belief and doubt, presence and absence.

Photography is often understood as a way of recording what is in front of the camera. Żak deliberately disrupts this relationship. Through subtle material interventions in his photographs, he makes the familiar unstable. Images that initially appear to document the world begin to feel like fragments of memory - something remembered, imagined or perhaps never truly seen.

In Est et non est, heaven is therefore less a distant place than an inner experience: fleeting, uncertain and impossible to fully grasp. The book becomes a quiet meditation on faith, longing and the limits of perception, while also asking a fundamental question about photography itself: can an image reveal something we cannot actually see?

Designed by Aneta Kowalczyk, the book extends this uncertainty into its physical form. Its Swiss binding, tactile papers and large-format poster create a sequence that moves between intimate photographic details and a more expansive, almost celestial scale. The book is not simply a container for Żak's photographs, but an integral part of how they are experienced.

A Special Edition of the book, including a signed and numbered pigment print, is also available.

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Awards:

• Shortlisted for the 2026 Fotopolis plebiscite

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Photographs: Paweł Żak
Texts: Mikołaj Grynberg, Paweł Żak
Book design: Aneta Kowalczyk

Cover: Soft cover with Swiss binding and one flap
Paper: Munken Kristall 100, 150 and 240 g

Format: 23.5 × 32 cm + poster 68 × 98 cm
Number of pages: 96
Number of photographs: 40
Language: English, French

Print run: 800 copies 
Printing and binding: Argraf (Warsaw, Poland)

Publication date: October 2025 
Publisher: BLOW UP PRESS (Warsaw, Poland)
ISBN: 978-83-977057-3-9

The book is published in partnership with