Conceptbrief aan onbekend 1871 - 1936

This letter was written by Andries Bonger, probably with a pen, in the late 19th or early 20th century. What I love about the way the words crowd the page, is how each line seems to be searching for space, almost like thoughts competing to be heard. There's a real physicality to the handwriting, you can almost feel the writer's hand moving across the page, sometimes pressing harder, sometimes lighter, each stroke carrying its own weight and energy. It’s a very intimate thing, handwriting, a direct trace of the body. Look at the way the ink pools in the loops of the letters, the subtle variations in tone that create depth and texture. It's these small details that bring the writing to life. It reminds me of Cy Twombly’s scrawls, but where Twombly is thinking about painting as writing, here we have writing as pure expression, a direct line into the writer’s mind. In the end, art is like a conversation, each artist building on what came before, adding their own voice to the mix.