Vantablack: The Story of Anish Kapoor and Stuart Semple

Disclaimer: This is meant to poke fun at an art controversy I find entertaining and is in no way meant to disparage any parties referenced.

By reading this story, you confirm that you are not Anish Kapoor, you are in no way affiliated with Anish Kapoor, and you are not sending this story to Anish Kapoor. To the best of your knowledge, information and belief this story will not be read by Anish Kapoor.

Once upon a time, there was an artist.

But not just any artist. This was a rich, fancy artist who wanted to make his art the best. The guy who made Cloud Gate in Chicago, a.k.a. the Bean (its much more fitting name), and hated when people called it the Bean. He was famous for his work with chromatics, always trying to make his art stand out with new color properties. So when scientists at Surrey NanoSystems invented and created applications for the blackest black on earth (at the time, there’s now a new one), called Vantablack, Anish Kapoor wanted in. Although Vantablack was created with technical applications in mind, the developers were willing to work with big-name Kapoor, whom they saw as a good fit due to his work, to introduce the color to the art world.

This new color, so dark that 99.96% of visible light would be absorbed in it, was now going to be available to artists. Super cool, could revolutionize art, all that, right? Except Kapoor, for some reason, thought the best plan for it was to…keep everyone else from using it?

He bought the sole rights to it. Meaning he was the only person in the world who could use it. And artists were mad, to say the least.

Enter Stuart Semple. Another artist, but much less rich and fancy. Semple had a passion for making great-quality pigment colors available to all artists…exactly the opposite of what Kapoor was doing. Obviously, something had to be done.

Semple had already been working on a new pigment: Pinkest Pink. It was pretty darn pink, alright. He added an important caveat: Anish Kapoor was banned from using it. Semple's website checkout had this statement:

By adding this product to your cart you confirm that you are not Anish Kapoor, you are in no way affiliated to Anish Kapoor, you are not purchasing this item on behalf of Anish Kapoor or an associate of Anish Kapoor. To the best of your knowledge, information and belief this paint will not make its way into the hands of Anish Kapoor.

Pinkest Pink went crazy. Semple got thousands of orders, people started Facebook events to "paint the Bean" (Semple himself hosting a participatory art performance where attendees would kiss the Bean with pink lipstick for Kapoor's birthday), and artists posted pictures of their work with the pigment using #sharetheblack.

Kapoor was not having this. Not long after the release of Pinkest Pink, he (clearly through dubious means) acquired a container of the pigment! Not only that…well, the picture speaks for itself.

It was officially on.

Semple didn’t give up. He still wanted other artists to have the use of a super-dark black, so he made Black 1.0. That wasn’t quite what he wanted—not matte enough—so with the help of other artists, he created Black 2.0. It was technically slightly less black than Vantablack, but visually almost indistinguishable. And it smelled like cherries! How much cooler could you get?

Much cooler. Or more petty, depending on your opinion. When Semple released the paint on his website Culturehustle, he included the same restriction as Pinkest Pink: Anish Kapoor was not allowed to use it either. Oh, and did I mention that Vantablack is highly toxic? Black 2.0 is only $16.99 a bottle, completely nontoxic and looks almost exactly the same.

And it could be used by everyone in the world except Anish Kapoor. He had gotten his fancy paint, but at what cost?

Semple kept creating paints and pigments in all sorts of vibrant colors. He made Diamond Dust, a beautiful sharp glitter (you wouldn’t want to stick your middle finger in it), and a paint called Shift that you had to mix with Black 2.0 to make it work. And yes, every paint or pigment was still unavailable to Kapoor.

So everyone in the art world (and beyond, like me) had a good laugh, and a bunch of people bought pigments from Stuart Semple’s art shop. He recently started making Black 3.0, which is even darker. Kapoor couldn’t really do much with his paint, due to its toxicity. He made a series of $95,000 watches, but so far, his art with Vantablack has been out of reach for many people.

But the story isn’t over. A couple years ago, Semple made the “glowiest glow” pigment, called Lit. He made it available “to provide all artists* with the ultimate light emitting paint.”

*Especially Anish Kapoor. If you are Anish Kapoor, can prove you are associated with Anish Kapoor or to the best of your knowledge information and belief this substance is going to make it's (sic) way into the hands of Anish Kapoor, your order will be free! We want you to know how lovely it feels to #shareTheLight

In the art world, drama never dies.