Vrouw met framboesia 1929

This page, entitled "Vrouw met framboesia", or “Woman with yaws” was produced at the Hospitaal Batak Instituut at some point. You can see a photo of the patient with the condition. It’s stuck onto a file page with the patient’s details typed below. This isn’t painting, but to me, it is so much about mark-making. The clinical information that’s been typed onto the page, that’s a form of gesture, it's writing. It reminds me of Cy Twombly, who knew how to make writing look like feeling. I wonder about the person who stuck the photo onto the page. What were they thinking? Were they hoping that one day somebody might find the image and be moved by it? Everything is a language; this page speaks volumes, as much as any painting. I suppose all art, in the end, tries to treat experience as something that can be caught, and held.