Brief aan Philip Zilcken Possibly 1920 - 1927

Here's a letter written in 1920 by Rose Imel, probably with a fountain pen. The marks are so alive, like a wire sculpture, bending and twisting in graceful, confident gestures. I love the process of writing, it's a way of thinking out loud with your hand. You can almost feel Imel's hand moving across the page, the ink flowing and pooling in tiny reservoirs of meaning. Look at how the letters connect and disconnect. It’s a dance between intention and accident, control and release, so immediate, so visceral. The rhythm reminds me of Cy Twombly's handwriting, all those loops and swoops like a jazz solo. The words, are more than just information; they're traces of her presence, a kind of embodied thought. This isn't just a letter, it's a performance, a record of a mind in motion. Like a painting, it invites us to slow down, to savor the texture and the feeling of the marks, to imagine the person behind them.