Brief aan jonkheer Barthold Willem Floris van Riemsdijk Possibly 1916

This letter was penned by August Allebé in 1916, and look at those grey-black strokes, the way they dance and huddle together. It feels so intimate, like eavesdropping on a conversation, don't you think? What strikes me is the texture of the handwriting – sharp turns and swooping lines that give the whole page a sense of movement. It's on paper, yes, but the ink has a real physicality. You can almost feel the scratch of the nib across the surface. See how the ink pools in certain spots, creating darker accents that highlight the rhythm of the script? It's almost like a Cy Twombly scribble, but with the constraint of language. Allebé's letter reminds me that art is really just an extended conversation, a relay race of ideas handed down through generations. It's a beautiful thing, this shared space of interpretation.