Dashrath Patel was a designer, painter, ceramist and photographer who passed away in 2010. Associated with the National Institute of Design for some 19 years, since its inception, he was one of the foremost visual thinkers of our time. He was, in art critic Sadanand Menon’s words, “a lucid thinker with original, non-pedantic, non-formal ideas on national culture and the need to harness the skills and capacities of ordinary people in creative social organisation.” He collaborated with Chandralekha on Why the Sky is Blue, a creative new book on science, based on Dr C.V Raman’s lecture. His photographs capture this multi-facted scientist’s many moods that express his love of science and the excitement of exploration.