Sometime in the late 1920s, a first-generation Italian-American named Daniel Terra took part in a tap audition. He wasn’t recalled, losing out to fellow Pennsylvanian Gene Kelly. But what might have been showbusiness’s loss became the art world’s gain.

Kelly went on to Hollywood stardom. Terra went back to school, studying chemical engineering at Pennsylvania State University. He became fascinated by ink (his father was a lithographer), eventually inventing a compound that made it dry almost immediately. This led to the development of high-speed rotary presses that revolutionised magazine printing.