Brief aan Philip Zilcken before 1904

This is a letter to Philip Zilcken by Léonce Bénédite, and look at that cursive! It's all about the touch, right? The way the pen just glides, or maybe even resists a little against the paper. You can almost feel the rhythm of Bénédite’s hand as he’s writing. I love how immediate handwriting is. The slight variations in pressure and speed make the line thick and thin in places. There’s something really human in those imperfections, and that physicality is so present. The ink itself—maybe it’s a dark sepia—creates this direct connection to the past. Imagine him pausing, maybe dipping the pen again, thinking about what to say next. It reminds me of Cy Twombly, and how he made marks dance on a big canvas. Ultimately, it’s about touch, about the joy and struggle of making something, leaving a trace of yourself behind. Art is always a conversation, a way of seeing and feeling that gets passed on, transformed, and re-imagined.