Boîte-hors-de-valise 6

Davis Lisboa, Boîte-hors-de-valise 6, 2017. Oil on linen, 40 × 40 × 3.5 cm (15.7 × 15.7 × 1.38 in).

The painting presents an open box suspended within a deep blue field. The form, partially dissolved, seems to emerge and fade at once, evoking the fluidity of a watercolor wash. The image avoids any narrative and settles into a point of balance between presence and disappearance.

The work takes the form of a still life that reinterprets Boîte-en-valise through a pictorial language. The portable museum becomes an image, a device that reflects on itself as archive and fragment. It aligns with a lineage of artists who have conceived the museum as an autonomous work, from La Boîte-en-valise by Marcel Duchamp to Galerie Légitime by Robert Filliou and Musée d’Art Moderne, Département des Aigles by Marcel Broodthaers.

Formally, the surface is built through straight lines and soft glazes that soften the contours. The forms remain unstable, never fully fixed, echoing pictorial processes associated with the photo-paintings of Gerhard Richter.

The work is part of The Paintings Section from Davis Museum Barcelona. The square format reflects the museum’s cubic structure, while the use of blue establishes a direct correspondence with its visual identity. The painting thus operates both as an autonomous image and as an element within a portable museological system.