Brief aan Ina van Eibergen Santhagens-Waller 1878 - 1938

This letter was written in 1935 by Richard Nicolaüs Roland Holst to Ina van Eibergen Santhagens-Waller. It’s mostly text, but the way the letters are formed, the handwriting itself becomes a kind of drawing. Look at the pressure of the pen. See how it varies, thick in some places, thin in others? I imagine Roland Holst really thinking as he writes, each word forming slowly, deliberately. It’s not just about the information he's conveying, but the actual physical act of writing. Notice, too, how the words crowd each other, some leaning into their neighbors, others standing apart. It’s a dense, textured surface. It reminds me a bit of Cy Twombly’s scrawls, that same sense of language pushing up against form, meaning dissolving into pure gesture. And how both suggest that art is just like having a conversation. There's no fixed point, it's all about the process and the exchange.