The first headlines came way back in 2014. British Indian artist Anish Kapoor was experimenting with Vantablack, a newly invented material said to be the blackest black ever made.
“This material is the blackest material in the universe. Blacker than a black hole. It absorbs 99.8 percent of all light,” Kapoor wrote in an email. (Artist Diemut Strebe actually created a blacker, 99.995 percent absorbent black with MIT scientists in 2019.)
It’s hard to find first hand sources tbh, but here’s as close as you can get from the guy who invented it. They decided to keep it exclusive because of how difficult it is to work with, and because they just aren’t actually in the art business.
Is Kapoor a dick? Idk, probably, that’s not my call to make. I just know that Stuart Semple is probably just as much of a dick.
https://www.gq-magazine.co.uk/article/vantablack-anish-kapoor
But if you read the articles, you’ll see that multiple artists wanted to work with the substance and Kapoor denied them access. Not the maker, but Kapoor himself. AND he stole the Pink that another artist patented just to be petty