Thomas Vandenberghe’s photographs exist in a world of quiet proximity and emotional residue. Working primarily in black-and-white silver gelatin prints, he captures fleeting, intimate scenes that feel like memories more than moments—raw and personal, yet never overtly confessional. His images, often lit with flash and seemingly shot in passing, carry a distinct sense of immediacy, even vulnerability.

Vandenberghe’s approach is as much about presence as it is about absence. Many of his prints are reprinted, repeated, faded, or physically torn, reflecting the fragile and often fractured process of remembering. These gestures do not merely alter the image—they become the image, embedding loss and longing directly into the photographic surface.

Rather than presenting photography as evidence or document, Vandenberghe treats it as a site of emotional processing. His work defies spectacle, drawing instead on the power of the almost-invisible: a gesture, a glance, a surface worn by time. Somewhere between snapshot and relic, his photographs whisper more than they declare—suggesting a personal lexicon shaped by tenderness, grief, and the shifting nature of closeness.