Briefkaart aan Philip Zilcken Possibly 1917

Adriaan Pit sent this postcard to Philip Zilcken in 1917, with a three cent stamp. It’s a whole other level of intimacy when an artist uses handwriting, isn’t it? I love the way the ink almost dances on the surface, thick in some places, almost disappearing in others. The handwriting feels incredibly performative, like a drawing. Look at the looping ascenders and descenders, the way the letters lean and connect – or don’t! – there’s something almost frantic about the script. Pit's handwriting, with its mix of legibility and near abstraction, reminds me a little of Cy Twombly's scribbled paintings – a kind of personal, coded language made visible. There’s real beauty in the everyday, and something almost poetic in these mundane messages traveling through time. It makes you wonder about the conversations that art facilitates, not just between artists, but between people, across generations.