Reading the title “spray light layer emerge,” one might imagine an exhibition shot with light. But in Adam Pendleton’s latest gallery show, that title refers less to visual content than to his technique. The four words reflect the process behind Pendleton’s predominantly monochromatic “Black Dada” paintings, works composed of paint, spray paint, ink, and watercolor, and populated with text and shapes that emerge from the background. Since his first solo exhibition (in 2005 at New York’s Yvon Lambert Gallery)—in which he presented two-color canvases printed with phrases from Black music and literature—Pendleton has been investigating the relationship between Blackness and abstraction. No series better exemplifies that pursuit than “Black Dada,” the focus of this show. —Jeanne Malle