I noticed that my viewerpane background color is fixed (might be since upgrading to DO11).
I changed the color in the prefs, hit apply.. nothing. Leave prefs, change image/folder etc. but.. nothing changes.
I set the background to red to make the issue pop out, else I don't use red of course.. o)
This viewer pane color I tried to change, is valid only for an empty viewer pane, I looked up the docs now and did not remember/know there were two different settings for this background color.