Brief aan Philip Zilcken Possibly 1919

This letter to Philip Zilcken was written by Vittorio Pica sometime in 1903. The script flows across the page like dark water. It’s intimate, like a whisper. Look at the way the lines of text build up, dense and then sparse; Pica varies the pressure, the rhythm almost a form of drawing. It’s a reminder that writing, like painting, is fundamentally a physical act, a dance of hand and eye. I’m drawn to the opening phrase, a formal expression of thanks. There's an emotional shift as Pica discusses the possibility of returning to France. The handwriting becomes smaller, more urgent. Maybe he was thinking, as he wrote, about the endless potential for connection and misunderstanding that lives in every letter. The letter reminds me of Cy Twombly’s scribbled paintings, a similar sense of language dissolving into gesture. Both artists embrace the beauty of imperfection, the idea that meaning isn't fixed, but emerges through process.