[huffman]

A good counter example to the pop art painter are Baroque painters, who used very dark colors very heavily in their pieces http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baroque_painting

[tripzilch]

Not much of those you linked to actually use pure black, but this one comes pretty close:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Francisco_de_Zurbarán_018....

It also happens to show very nicely what's wrong with using pure black as shadows: they're not shadows, they're holes.

(what a god-awful painting, btw. and they compare his work to Caravaggio's ... )