Pedro Cabrita Reis

The Black Monochrome

2003

The work is displayed as part of the permanent exhibition

Painting

Aluminium, acrylic on glass
255 x 170 x 30 cm
Purchased with funding from the J.F. Costopoulos Foundation, 2006
Inv. No. 573/06

Pedro Cabrita Reis belongs to a generation of artists who, in the mid 1980s, opposed the sterility and objectivism that characterized the minimalist and conceptual art of the previous decades. His work includes a plethora of media, from large-scale drawings and paintings to monumental installations and architectural constructions. He often makes use of industrial and construction materials, as well as elements drawn from various buildings, in order to explore the relationship between space, architecture, and memory, and challenge spatial boundaries. Cabrita Reis’ The Black Monochrome is a black (monochromatic) triptych painting made of acrylic on glass. The artist has divided the surface defined by the steel frame into two parts: the upper part allows the viewer to directly observe the work’s visible painting matter, while the lower part is covered by a sleek and transparent surface of glass. The reflection produced by the glass does not allow the audience to see what lies beneath, inside the work; all the viewers can effectively see is their own reflections. This black void alludes to the presence of a door or a window. At the same time, it could also be seen as a “gate” to an introspective journey which connects the inside with the outside, the private with the public, the real with the imaginary, enabling the transformation of architectural construction into painting
Daphne Vitali, ENTER EMST: Collection and history, A short guide, 2020