Brief aan Héloïse Bernard-Bodin 1878 - 1941

This letter to Héloïse Bernard-Bodin was written in 1897 by Emile Bernard, using ink on paper. It’s a work of layered communication, a handwritten missive that’s both intimate and revealing. The ink sprawls across the page, a deep purple-blue that suggests both urgency and introspection. The script is dense, the lines packed closely together, creating a textured surface that mirrors the complexity of thought. Look at how Bernard crams words into the margins, a visual echo of the constraints and freedoms inherent in the act of writing. It’s hard not to think of Vincent Van Gogh, Bernard's contemporary. Van Gogh used the same urgent mark making to communicate in his letters. The letter, like a painting, is a site of process and discovery, a space where meaning emerges through the act of creation. Both men used their art as a conversation. The meaning is not just in what is said but in how it's expressed.