The Proof (2026)

Jakub Szachnowski

The Proof follows a fictional investigation into a mysterious object that exists in reality: Mount Wdżar. Its magnetic anomalies, geological history and surrounding stories provide the starting point for an inquiry that moves between documented facts and imagined explanations. Drawing on parafiction, the artist adopts the methods and visual language of field research, assembling photographs, maps, notes and objects into a plausible account of an investigation. Each piece of material offers a possible clue, while leaving the conclusions open to question. Images from the SOLARIS synchrotron bring this inquiry into a scientific setting, where instruments translate otherwise inaccessible phenomena into data and images that require interpretation. Together, these two settings frame an exploration of the desire to understand the unknown, the ways credibility is established and the point at which an image begins to function as evidence.

Project under the patronage of:

SOLARIS National Synchrotron Radiation Centre, Cracow

Publication details

• Format: 17 × 22 cm

• Pages: 80, printed in two colours throughout, offset

• Paper: GardaPat Klassica, 135 gsm

• Binding: Hardcover 

• Cover: Remake Carapace Oyster, 120 gsm, printed in one colour, with a blind-debossed recess and a tipped-in photograph

• Endpapers: Crush Almond, 120 gsm

• Inside back cover: A 16 × 14 cm pocket made from the endpaper stock and two books inside with esseys (PL&ENG)

Photographs and sequencing: Jakub Szachnowski

Design: Jakub Szachnowski

Texts: Katarzyna Szachnowska, Dr Tomasz Tarnawski

Conceptual consultation: Paweł Klein

Proofreading: Katarzyna Szachnowska

Prepress: Tomasz Kawecki

Published in 2026 by RUST Publishing

First edition: 500 copies

ISBN: 978-83-981360-1-3