Brief aan Jan Veth Possibly 1905 - 1919

This is a letter, "Brief aan Jan Veth," written in 1905 by Willem Witsen. It's just ink on paper, but it's so much more than that. I love that writing is really just drawing, isn't it? A long and elegant squiggle, a looping dance. Look at the way Witsen's pen just glides across the page, these dark and rhythmic marks creating a field of thought, emotion, and who knows what else. It's like each word is a little gesture, a little performance. Notice the way the lines sometimes thicken and blur, as though the pen lingered there, or perhaps the ink was running out. Art is like a conversation, a kind of call and response. Witsen's work reminds me of Cy Twombly's, actually - that same sense of playful energy, of letting the hand lead the way. Art is never really finished, you know? It just keeps going, changing, and surprising us, like a good story that never ends.