Martin Kemp, né le à Windsor (Berkshire), est un historien de l'art britannique, professeur émérite à l'université d'Oxford, spécialiste de Léonard de Vinci. Ses ouvrages et ses articles sont traduits dans plusieurs langues.
Biographie Diplômé de l'université de Cambridge, Martin Kemp est chercheur à l'Institut Courtauld, puis professeur chercheur à la British Academy de 1993 à 1998, et professeur d'histoire de l'art aux universités de Saint Andrews, de Glasgow et d'Oxford. En 1989, il organise l'exposition Léonard de Vinci à Londres.
Martin Kemp a également enseigné comme professeur invité aux universités de Princeton, de New York, de Caroline du Nord, de Los Angeles et de Montréal.
Il est à l'origine du projet Universal Leonardo.
Il a authentifié le tableau Salvator Mundi comme étant une œuvre de Léonard de Vinci., attribution contestée par d'autres historiens d'art ..
Dans Mona Lisa: The People and the Painting (2017), Martin Kemp réévalue les circonstances de la naissance de Léonard de Vinci et l'identité de sa mère, une paysanne âgée de 15 ans..
Publications Art, science et histoire de la science
'Geometrical Bodies as Exemplary Forms in Renaissance Space', World Art. Themes of Unity in Diversity (Acts of the XXVI International Congress for the History of Art, Washington, 1986, éd. I. Lavin, Pennsylvanie et Londres, I, 1989, pp. 237–41. 'Taking it on Trust: Form and Meaning in Naturalistic Representation', Archives of Natural History, XVII, 1990, pp. 127–88. '"La diminutione di ciasun piano": la rappresentazione delle forme nello spazio di Francesco di Giorgio', Prima di Leonardo, exh. cat., éd. P. Galluzzi, Palazzo Comunale, Siena, 1991, pp. 105–12. 'Prescriptions for Painting: '"Optical Information" in Art from the Renaissance to the Late Nineteenth Century', Kungl. Vitterhets Historie och Antikvitets Akademiens Konferenser (Stockholm), XXIII, 1991, pp. 9–28. 'Intellectual Ornaments: Style, Interpretation and Function and Society in Some Instruments of Art', Interpretation and Cultural History, ed. J. Pittock et A. Wear, Londres, 1991, pp. 135–52. 'True to their Natures: Sir Joshua Reynolds and Dr. William Hunter at the Royal Academy of Arts', Notes and Records of the Royal Society of London, XLVI, 1992, pp. 77–88. '"The Mark of Truth": Looking and Learning in some Anatomical Illustrations from the Renaissance and the Eighteenth Century', Medicine and the Five Senses, ed. W. Bynum et R. Porter, Cambridge, 1993, pp. 85–121. 'Picturing the Prehistoric', review symposium of M. Rudwick's, Scenes from Deep Time, in: Metascience, IV, 1993, pp. 70–3. '"Philosophy in Sport" and the "Sacred Precincts': Sir David Brewster on the Kaleidoscope and Stereoscope', Muse and Reason. The Relation of Arts and Sciences 1650–1850, ed. B. Castel, J. Leith et A. Riley, Kingston (Ontario), 1994, pp. 203–32 (with Appendix by B. Pert) 'Piero and the Idiots: the Early Fortuna of his Theories', 'Monarca della pittura'. Piero della Francesca and his Legacy, éd. M. Lavin, National Gallery, Washington, 1995, pp. 199–211. Materia Medica. A New Cabinet of Art and Medicine, exhibition and catalogue with K. Arnold, Wellcome Institute, Londres, 1995. Bodyscapes. Images of Human Anatomy from the University of St. Andrews, exhibition and catalogue, Crawford Centre, 1995. 'Spirals of Life: D'Arcy Thompson and Theodore Cook, with Leonardo and Dürer in Retrospect', Physis, XXXII, 1995, pp. 37–54. "Relativity not Relativism: Thoughts on the Histories of Art and science having Reread Panofsky”, Meaning in the Visual Arts. Visions from the Outside (Erwin Panofsky. A Centennial Celebration), ed. I. Lavin, 1995. 'New Light on Old Theories: Piero della Francesca and the Transmission of Light', Piero della Francesca tra arte e scienza, ed. M. Dalai Emiliani and V. Curzi, Venise, 1996, pp. 33–46. 'Temples of the Body and Temples of the Cosmos: Vision and Visualisation in the Vesalian and Copernican Revolutions', for volume on Picturing Knowledge. Historical and Philosophical Problems Concerning the Use of Art in Science, ed. B. Baigrie, Toronto, 1996, pp. 40–85. '"Wrought by No Artist's Hand": the Natural, Artificial and Exotic in Some Artefacts from the Sixteenth Century', Reframing the Renaissance: Visual Culture in Europe and Latin America, 1450–1650, ed. C. Farago, New Haven et Londres, 1996, pp. 177–96. '"Implanted in our Natures": Humans, Plants and the Stories of Art', Visions of Empire. Voyages, Botany and Representations of Nature, éd. D. Miller, Los Angeles, 1996, pp. 197–229. 'Doing What Comes Naturally: Morphogenesis and the Limits of the Genetic Code', Art Journal, éd. B. Sichel et E. Levy, Spring 1996, pp. 27–32. 'The Ambiguous Object: the Perception of Artefacts within Changing Taxonomies', The World, the Image and Aesthetic Experience. Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Perception and Understanding, ed. C. Murath et S. Price, Bradford, 1996, pp. 193–222. 'In the Light of Dante: Meditations on Natural Light and Divine Light in Piero della Francesca, Raphael and Michelangelo', Ars naturam adiuvans. Festschift für Matthias Winner, ed. V. von Flemming et S. Schütze, 1996, pp. 160–77. ‘Art and Science, The Art Quarterly, Spring 1996, pp. 33–5. 'Seeing Subjects and Picturing Science: Visual Representation in 20th-Century Science', for 20th-Century Science, ed. J. Krige et D. Pestre, Amsterdam, 1997, pp. 361–90. ‘Medicine in View: Art and Representation’, for Western Medicine. An Illustrated History, ed. I. Loudon, Oxford, 1997, pp. 1–24. ‘Parading the Horse’,The Art Quarterly, XXX, 1997, pp. 24–31. ‘Hidden Dimensions’, ‘tate’. The Art Magazine, 13, 1997, pp. 40–4. ‘Art and Science’, 28 articles in weekly series in Nature from 23 October 1997, to 30 April 1998 (essays on topics from the Renaissance to now) ‘Science and Image’, 36 articles in weekly series in Nature from 7 May 1998 to December 1998 (essays on the visual aspects of the sciences from the Renaissance to now; see also below)) ‘‘Palissy’s Philosophical Pots: ceramics, grottos and the “Matrice” of the earth’, Le origini della Modernità, ed. W. Tega, 2 vols., Florence, 1999, pp. 69–88. Imagine e Verità. Per una storia dei rapporti fra arte e scienza, Il Saggiatore, Milan, 1999. Introductory essay in The Physician’s Art. Representations in Art and Medicine, Duke University Medical Centre, 1999, pp. 13–9. “Vision and Visualisation in the Illustration of Anatomy and Astronomy from Leonardo to Galileo”, 1543 and All That, éd. A. Corones and G. Freeland, Kluver, Amsterdam, 2000, pp. 17–51. with Debora Schultz, ‘Us and Them, This and That, Here and There, Now and Then: Collecting, Classifying and Creating’, Strange and Charmed. Science and the Contemporary Visual Arts, ed. S. Ede, Londres, 2000, pp. 84–103. ‘The Temple of Flora. Robert Thornton, Plant Sexuality and Romantic Science’, Natura-Cultura. L’interpretazione del mondo fisico nei testi e nelle immagini, ed. G. Olmi, L. Tongorgi Tomasi and A. Zanca, Florence, 2000, pp. 15–28. “The Handyworke of the Incomprehensible Creator”, Writing on Hands. Memory and Knowledge in Early Modern Europe, ed. C.R. Sherman et P.M. Lukehart, Dickinson College et bibliothèque Folger Shakespeare, Washington, 2000, pp. 22–7. Visualizations: the Nature Book of Art and Science (based on articles for Nature), 2000, Oxford University Press and University of California Press (also in German) avec Marina Wallace, Spectacular Bodies. The Art and Science of the Human Body from the Renaissance to Now, book for exhibition at Hayward Gallery in London, University of California Press, 2000. 'Vedere lo spazio e misurare le immagini: Brunelleschi e la prospettiva urbana’, La Cattedrale come spazio sacro (Atti del VII centenario del Duomo di Firenze, vol. II, pt. 2), ed. T. Verdon et A, Innocenti, Florence, 2001, pp. 661–72. “From Different Points of View: Corrgeggio, Copernicus & the Mobile Observer”, Coming About… A Festschrift for John Shearman, ed. L. Jones and L. Matthew, Cambridge (Mass.), 2001, pp. 207–13. “The Flower of Mathematics: Perspective in Perspective”, Geometry and Space. The Celebrated Books on Geometry, Optics and Perspective of M. Arnaud de Vitry, Sotheby’s, Londres, 10– “Looking and Counting. From the Visual to the Non-Visual”, Gregor Mendel. The Genius of Genetics, ed. C. Albano and M. Wallace, Brno, 2002, pp. 56–63. “Gregor Mendel; the genius of genetics”, Interdisciplinary Science Reviews, XXVII, 2002, pp. 120–124. “The Mona Lisa of Modern Science”, 50 Years of DNA, ed. J. Clayton et C. Dennis, Nature / Palgrave, Basingstoke, 2003, pp. 102–6; also in The Double Helix – 50 years, Nature Supplement, . “Wissen in Bildern – Intuitionen in Kunst und Wissenschaft”, Iconic Turn. Die Macht der Bilder, ed. C. Marr and H. Burda, Cologne, 2004, pp. 382–406. with Antonio Criminisi et Sing Bing Kang, “Reflections of Reality in Jan van Eyck and Roger Campin”, Historical Methods, III, 2004, pp. 109–21. “From science in art to the art of science”, Nature, 434, , pp. 308–9, also as Supplement: artists on science; scientists on art. Seen and Unseen. Art, Science, and Intuition from Leonardo to the Hubble Telescope, Oxford University Press, 2006. ‘Science and Culture’, series of monthly articles in Nature from January 1999 – 2011. The Chapel of Trinity College, Oxford. With photographs by Tim Rawle. Londres, Scala Arts & Heritage Publishers, 2014. .
Léonard de Vinci 'Il concetto dell'anima in Leonardo's Early Skull Studies', Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, XXXV, 1971, pp. 155–34. 'Dissection and Divinity in Leonardo's Late Anatomies', Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, XXXV, 1972, pp. 200–25. 'Ogni dipintore dipinge se: A Neoplatonic Echo in Leonardo's Art Theory?', in Cultural Aspects of the Italian Renaissance: Essays in Honour of Paul Oskar Kristeller, ed. C.H. Clough, Manchester, 1976, pp. 3 11–23. 'Leonardo and the Visual Pyramid', Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, XXXIX, 1977, pp. 128–49. 'Navis Ecclesiae: an Ambrosian metaphor in Leonardo's Allegory of the 1515 Concordat', Bibliothèque d'Humanisme et Renaissance, XLIII, 1981, pp. 257–268. 'Leonardo's Leda and the Belvedere River Gods: Roman Sources and a New Chronology' (written jointly with Professor Alastair Smart of Nottingham) Art History, II, , pp. 182–193. Leonardo da Vinci: The Marvellous Works of Nature and Man, Londres et Cambridge (Mass), 1981. (Mitchell Prize 1981), reprinted with minor revisions, 1989; revised edition, 2006 (below) Leonardo da Vinci: le mirabili operazioni della natura e dell'uomo, Milan, 1982. 'The Crisis of Received Wisdom in Leonardo's late Thought/La crisi del sapere tradizionale nell'ultimo Leonardo', in Leonardo e l'Età della Ragione, ed. E. Bellone and P. Rossi, Milan, 1982, 27–52. 'Leonardo dopo Milano', The Burlington Magazine, No. CXXIV, 1982 p. 788. 'Leonardo's Maps and the "Body of the Earth"', Bulletin of the Society of University Cartographers, XVII, 1984, pp. 9–19. 'Leonardo da Vinci: Science and Poetic Impulse', Journal of the Royal Society of Arts (Selwyn Brinton Lecture), CXXXIII, 1985, pp. 196–214. 'Analogy and Observation in the Codex Hammer', Studi Vinciani in Memoria di Nando di Toni, ed. M. Pedini, Brescia, 1986, pp. 103–34. 'The Inventions of Nature and the Nature of Invention, Leonardo. Engineer and Architect, ed. P. Galluzzi, Montreal, 1987 (in French as `Les Inventions de la nature et la nature de l'invention'), Leonardo da Vinci. Ingénieur et architecte, pp. 141–44. 'Late Leonardo: Problems and Implications', Art Journal, XLVII, 1987, pp. 94–102. '"A Chaos of Intelligence": Leonardo's Trattato and the Perspective Wars in the Académie Royale', 'Il se rendit en Italie'. Études offertes à André Chastel, Paris, 1987. 'Leonardo e lo spazio dello scultore', XXVII, Lettura Vinciana, (Vinci, 1987), Florence, 1988.