‘The Cellotex works marked a brand new approach, evident in the quality of the painted surfaces and the particular way Alberto Burri manipulated such a basic material, so long part of his work but neglected like a secret, unpresentable lover. Finally, the wood composite board, always present in his studio, was brought out into the light in all its austere but accessible poverty. As he worked on it, before covering its surfaces with acrylic paint and vinavil, Burri probed its desert expanse and acquiescence with the point or blade of a tool he used instead of a pencil to extract the image and form of a new and more daring expressive mode. The concept and creation of a pictorial space in the case of Burri’s “black” painting, is above all due to two factors: on the one hand, a blind faith in his own ability to obtain, from a color such as black, an infinite range of variations as, in actual fact, is demonstrated by his works; on the other, the possession of a technical skill able to gain from celotex a diversified surface-sensibility in order to obtain, as with a well-ploughed field, a modulation of depths for variously underlining the gradations of light falling on them.’– Prof. Bruno Corà, President of Fondazione Burri, Città di Castello
