Thanks a lot! I saw the second post but not the first so I was missing a lot of the important context (notably the fact that Kapoor was selected by the company who developed Vantablack, rather than decide to “greedily keep it for itself” as the narrative goes)
Also, it’s not a pigment or a paint. He can’t “greedily keep it to himself” because you physically cannot use it. It’s an application of carbon nanotubes. It has to be done in a lab under extremely controlled conditions. It’s also not actually made for art but for industrial applications. The company that developed it decided they wanted to show off their neat new process, so they decided to pick one artist to work with.
The company’s CEO stated that they picked Kapoor specifically because of his previous work, namely stuff like The Bean. So, again, they were never going to pick Semple or any of the other white dudes who whined really loudly in the press, and why? Because they don’t do art like that at all.
So yeah.
I don’t have a horse in this race but Semple will never ever, ever eveerrr have a net worth of $700 million. That’s Kapoor. Semple, probs maybe maaaybe could claim a million. barely. On his best day.
Kapoor is close to a billionaire. He’s also been a needless jerk about the ‘don’t let Kapoor have this pink paint I made’ Semple did as a gimmick.
Semple makes affordable decent art paints. Okay, nice.
Like. Why …bother hiring someone to sign a contract that they will not sell to Kapoor the cheap pink paint and then get it from them, stick your middle finger in it, and post it online? Just…why bother? Yeah the nano stuff is cool and I want you to go hard. Go do that instead, man.
Are certain things in life harder and/or denied Kapoor because or racism vs Semple? Yeah. It sucks. It sucks donkey balls.
Being an almost billionaire probably makes life a lil easier tho.
Do you think that maybe racism and antisemitism being a big fucking ha ha joke might affect others more pointedly and perhaps we might want people to fucking knock it off?
Imagine having the money to be a litigious fuck ass, the money to bury Semple in substantiated Libel cases and all you do is flip a pink bird on twitter.
I would say that’s mild and dare I say good natured, Semple presented this as a feud and you all get mad when the man he targets plays along.
Also “why bother hiring someone to sign a contract that they will not sell to Kapoor the cheap pink paint and then get it from them” is a bit dramatic. The anti-Kapoor spiel is literally just a note in the item description on Semple’s shop that basically says “if you buy this paint it means you pinky promise you’re not Anish Kapoor.” It’s not a contract, it’s a publicity stunt. Dude could have easily bought it himself
Plus, what does Stuart Semple “only” having a million dollars have to do with a discussion about him benefiting from a racist and antisemitic narrative that he invented to sell paint?
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