Brief aan Philip Zilcken Possibly 1900 - 1929

This is Wijnand Otto Jan Nieuwenkamp’s letter to Philip Zilcken, created in 1900 with pen and ink on paper. I can imagine Nieuwenkamp sitting at his desk, maybe the light is fading, and he’s writing in a flurry, eager to share his thoughts with Zilcken. The paper has a grid on it, a very precise, architectural thing, and then there's the handwriting flowing across it, pressing down with the nib to create these elegant forms. It makes me think about the conversation between precision and looseness, control and letting go. You know, it's funny how handwriting can be so deeply personal. Each curve, each slant tells a story about the writer’s hand, their mood, their intention. You can feel the artist in the letter. And, in the end, this makes me think about how every mark we make carries a bit of ourselves, connecting us to each other across time and space.