What does an accidental alchemical reaction in an 18^th century Berlin laboratory have to do with Kiran Nadar Museum of Art’s (KNMA) latest exhibition? A lot, apparently, as the product transformed art making. This incident dates back to between 1704-07 when two German alchemists, Jacob Diesbach and Johann Konrad Dippel, were engaged in composing a batch of cochineal red (made from bugs). Accidentally, they added potash contaminated by (the iron in) animal blood. Their serendipitous concoction culminated in a deep blue. The accidental pigment was termed Berliner Blau or later Prussian Blue, coined after the Prussian soldier’s jackets dyed in the same hue. A rival to the prohibitively expensive ultramarine or lapis lazuli, Prussian Blue instantly became a sensation for artistic palettes across the globe. It revolutionised an art industry starving of a stable blue pigment.

Delhi-based KNMA’s show Prussian Blue: A Serendipitous Colour that Altered the Trajectory of Art (September 19-December 20, 2023), is an impressive survey encompassing 19 artists that reinterpret the versatility of the pigment across a range of experimental mediums and artistic forms. Curated by Arshiya Lokhandwala, the starting point is personal and nostalgic. Lokhandwala tells STIR, "The show is inspired by my late father Mansoor Lokhandwala, who had a paint factory and loved experimenting with colour, with his favourite being Prussian blue." Each work, newly commissioned for this show, unpacks various dimensions of Prussian blue. The pieces speak to the transcendently calm but deep, melancholic but introspective nature of the pigment.

The Japanese woodblock artist Katsushika Hokusai was one of the first Asian artists to embrace the colour boldly. The astounding power of Hokusai’s iconic The Great Wave off Kanagawa (around 1831) is contingent on the pigment. It lent itself to expressing the depth of the water gushing against three boats. Anju Dodiya pays homage to Hokusai in her work Sea-wind of the Night (2023). The artist imposes Hokusai’s great wave crashing against the silhouette of a female, re-interpreting the form as a visual representation of the onslaught of time.

While Dodiya explores the depths below, NS Harsha explores the infinite—within us as well as the outward, surrounding us. A sparkling-suited astronomer, depicted in his large painting Andhar Bahar (2023), reflects on the astronomers who fly out of the earth’s atmosphere to discover the workings of the cosmos as well as the astronomers within us who journey into the personal depths of the mind and soul. On a similar note, Desmond Lazaro’s paintings examine the fundamental equations of astrophysics, the building blocks of how we relate the stars today.

Cyanotypes, a photographic printing process that produces blueprints using chemically coated paper and light, were explored by several artists. Sumakshi Singh’s wall text note on his artwork titled Light Song (2023) reads: “When invited to participate in this show, I was most drawn to the light-sensitive quality of this pigment, which enabled the invention of architectural blueprints. A variation on the blueprint process, cyanotype involves coating the paper, thread or fabric with a mixture of chemicals, which when exposed to sunlight generate a deep Prussian blue.” Parul Gupta’s artwork Interplay #139 - #146 (2023) exposed the cyanotype prints to UV light. The exposure time under UV light determined different intensities of the colour and in the works can be observed the pigment’s tremendous tinting strength.

For others, the pigment is a way to pose political statements and to raise socio-environmental commentary. Anita Dube creates seven wall-mounted steel words, illuminated by a blue light. The words start with the letter “B”—balatkar (meaning rape), bribe, blues (suggesting her love for jazz blues), blasphemy, and many more, with the last word being “beauty”. Dube leaves the viewer with a rather introspective after-thought: 'What is the definition of beauty in the truest sense today?'

Shambhavi Bhurukuwaa’s sculptural renditions empathise with the enduring labour of the farmers as they rise and sleep under the Prussian blue sky. The installation includes repurposed farming tools including the sickle. Thukral and Tagra present Aftermath (2023), a mechanical sculpture born out of an early exploration of the harrowing reality of farmers in India. Blue ink infused in a pesticide container triggers sprays at 40-minute intervals, evoking a statistic from an Oxfam report that a farming fatality occurs every 40 minutes in India. The presence of stark yellow around the installation is a reminder of the need for a social change.

A highlight is Sheba Chhachhi’s Ajab Karkhana (Strange Manufactory) (2023) comprising 600 pieces of laboratory glassware suspended eerily in a quiet corner painted in Prussian blue. Accompanied by an audio-visual sensorial experience, the installation transports one into a time machine fast forwarding through the history of the pigment. Lokhandwala says, “As you know, Prussian blue was invented in a laboratory by accident. Incidentally, Prussian blue also contains cyanide and the artist [Sheba Chhachhi] in this work addresses the toxicity promoted by the big pharma and their greed to convert ‘medicine, paint, (into) poison’.” For the artist, this installation strongly stands for “epistemic corruption, environmental contamination, and epidemic contagion.”

In contradiction to the literal uses of the colour, Mithu Sen’s artwork Tritanopia (blindness of blue) contains no literal traces of blue. This pursuit is focused on the ethereal nature of colour—intangible yet capable of evoking an experience. Thus, the absence of the pigment becomes a pivotal reference point. “The inability to see the colour blue highlights the significance of the colour in our lives and how it affects our perception of the world around us,” adds the curator.

With contemporary visual voices across India, this survey leaves the viewers contemplating the many symbolisms, ideas and thoughts associated with this pigment. Amidst a sea of blue works, each artwork in and on its own successfully manages to bring a whole new perspective to the pigment. Wassily Kandinsky’s quote, included in the curator’s note is resonant: “The deeper the blue becomes, the more strongly it calls man towards the infinite, awakening in him a desire for the pure and, finally, for the supernatural...”