The 1988 telephone book is a monument to forgotten literature. An anonymous masterpiece that presents itself as nothing more than an alphabetical list of names, numbers, streets and postcodes — but those who dare to look closely will discover a bitter and painfully precise account of human existence. Not in the letters themselves, but in the space between them. There, in the silences between “Janssen, MH” and “Janssens, P.” lives a melancholy that has rarely been catalogued so precisely. The book contains tens of thousands of characters, all as superficial as they are universal. The absence of descriptive context is not a limitation, but rather the strength of this work. By not telling us who these people are, we are forced to project our own fears, memories and desires onto them. You read: "Vermeer, T. - Witte de Withstraat 12 - 010 4213991", and suddenly you feel guilty that you never called T. Vermeer back. You wonder if he ever moved. If anyone still answers that number. The theme of the desire for solitude — and the paradoxical longing for connection — is masterfully rendered in the format itself. Each individual stands alone, neatly framed by others, but always separated. This is not the chaotic proximity of a fictional character you get to know in dialogues or inner monologues. No, this is existential bureaucracy. Here we, the people of 1988, are reduced to accessibility information. A collective cry of “I exist” in the form of numbers.