FERNANDA FRAGATEIRO
Montijo, Portugal, 1962
Received the Fundación Botín Art Grant in 2004

Measuring E1027, 2011
Handmade notebooks in acrylic with fabric covers and pages from the book
Maison en bord de mer (by Eileen Gray and Jean Badovici, facsimile edition, Marseille: Éditions Imbernon, 2006; original edition in L’Architecture vivante, Paris: Éditions Albert Morancé, 1929) (21 elements)
Acquired in 2021

Measuring E1027 examines the modernist house designed by Irish architect Eileen Gray by unfolding a subtle visual narrative of erasure and recovery, which lies at the heart of the building’s history. This recovery involves not only a physical act of reconstruction but also an act of “returning” the house to its rightful designer and owner. During the postwar years, E1027 was mistakenly attributed to Le Corbusier, who had painted eight murals on the interior and exterior walls of the villa without Gray’s permission—an act she regarded as vandalism. It was not until 1969, when Emmanuelle and Jean-Paul Rayon measured the villa, that Gray’s authorship was finally restored.

What at first glance appears to be three rows of minimalist black paintings is, upon closer inspection, revealed to be 21 handmade black books with inserted pages from the reissue of the E.1027 Maison En Bord de Mer portfolio, published in 2006 following its first edition in Architecture Vivante in 1929. Suspended on the wall, the installation unfolds like a series of paintings where, as in Gray’s architecture, a path of shifting perspectives slowly reveals itself, inviting the viewer into a kinetic experience. Looking inside the black books, one can see image details: drawings, texts, architectural spaces, furniture, and landscape. These images are documents of the original house, made and published at the time the house was built.