Empty Forest

In 1909, a young mother called Emma Hauck was admitted in the psychiatric hospital of Heidelberg (Germany). She was diagnosed with Schizophrenia. Eleven years later Emma would pass away in an asylum in Wiesloch at the age of 42. Around that time a touching and intense collection of letters was found in the archives of the Heidelberg hospital. All of these letters were written obsessively to her husband Michael, begging him to collect her. Each desperate letter is written with overlapping words. Some are so condensed as to be illegible. Some read “herzensschatzi komm’ (darling come) over and over; others only repeat the words, ‘komm, komm, komm’ (come) thousands of times. The letters were never sent…