The Weight of Letters

“The letter is the thin thread that is still able to confirm and preserve our identity and belonging. It is simultaneously yearned for and dreaded.”

— Cecilia Boisier

Artists have long used letters as a motif and medium to express feelings of longing and loneliness. For many People living far from home, letter writing was a vital lifeline. During the Cold War, under military dictatorships and in exile, mail was often the only way to stay in touch with family and friends. Telephone calls were expensive and insecure, and travel was restricted or impossible.

Consequently, letters became repositories of political developments, containing accounts of arrests, flight and loss. At the same time, letters preserved the personal, including shared memories and the bonds that sustained lasting relationships. Despite the distance, letters created intimacy and forged connections, albeit with a delay and always vulnerable to loss, censorship and political surveillance.

Therefore, to write meant not only sharing thoughts, but also finding ways to communicate despite omissions, coded language and silence. Some of the works on display relate to Mail Art. This movement emerged in the 1960s and used letters to create relationships across political borders, express solidarity and facilitate artistic exchange.

Cecilia Boisier

Schlafend II (Sleeping II)

(1981)

Until the 1973 military coup forced her and her two children into exile, the painter Cecilia Boisier (* 1943 in Santiago de Chile; † September 2026 in Berlin) lived and worked in Chile. In 1975 she moved to West Berlin by way of Argentina. Boisier’s paintings reflect a quiet melancholy that speaks to the isolation and challenges of life in exile. Schlafend II depicts a woman lying in bed, holding a letter. Boisier said about this work: “The letter is a fragile thread that still confirms and sustains our identity and sense of belonging. It is both longed for and feared. It can bring new pain or nourish our hope. Arriving without warning, it consumes our thoughts constantly. Often, we fall asleep holding it.”

Painting of a reclining person with brown hair holding a book.

Kreuzberg: Kunst und Migration seit 1960, installation view, Gropius Bau, 2026

Hyun-Sook Song

Sketch of a female nurse wearing a cap, seated, holding a piece of paper.

Kreuzberg: Kunst und Migration seit 1960, installation view, Gropius Bau, 2026

Reading a Letter on the Toilet (Hospital)

(1979 / 2026)

Since the 1980s, Hyun-Sook Song has developed a distinctive visual language, with the brushstroke at its core. She came to West Germany in 1972 as one of around 11,000 nurses recruited from South Korea between 1966 and 1977. Originally intending to return to South Korea after a few years, she instead studied painting at the University of Fine Arts Hamburg from 1976 to 1981 and at the National University in Gwangju in 1984. The works presented in the exhibition were created earlier, at the hospital. During quieter night shifts, her duty room became a workspace where she wrote letters and made drawings, processing her experiences as a nurse, feelings of loneliness and a longing for her family and for life within a village community.

After Song's arrival, Korean nurses in West Berlin founded their own association; the struggle against their own deportation led to the formation of the nationwide Korean Women's Group in 1978, in which Song later became involved, advocating for the rights of recruited workers.