Martin J Kemp

Martin Kemp , one of the world's leading experts on Leonardo da Vinci, was trained in Natural Sciences and Art History at Cambridge University and the Courtauld Institute, London. His 25 books include The Science of Art: Optical Themes in Western Art from Brunelleschi to Seurat (Yale), and The Human Animal in Western Art and Science (Chicago). He has published and broadcast extensively on Leonardo da Vinci, including the prize-winning Leonardo da Vinci: The Marvellous Works of Nature and Man...See more

Martin Kemp , one of the world's leading experts on Leonardo da Vinci, was trained in Natural Sciences and Art History at Cambridge University and the Courtauld Institute, London. His 25 books include The Science of Art: Optical Themes in Western Art from Brunelleschi to Seurat (Yale), and The Human Animal in Western Art and Science (Chicago). He has published and broadcast extensively on Leonardo da Vinci, including the prize-winning Leonardo da Vinci: The Marvellous Works of Nature and Man and Leonardo (both Oxford). His Christ to Coke: How Image Becomes Icon (Oxford) looks at 11 types of icons across a wide range of public imagery. He has written regularly for Nature , his essays for which have been published as Visualizations and developed in Seen and Unseen (both Oxford). His most recent books are Art in History (Profile Books) and Mona Lisa with Giuseppe Pallanti (Oxford). Living with Leonardo (Thames and Hudson) was published in March 2018. Kemp has been a Trustee of the National Galleries of Scotland, The Victoria and Albert Museum, and The British Museum. He has curated and co-curated a series of exhibitions on Leonardo and other themes, including "Circa 1492" at the National Gallery in Washington, "Spectacular Bodies" at the Hayward Gallery in London, "Leonardo da Vinci: Experience, Experiment, Design" at the Victoria and Albert Museum and "Seduced: Sex and Art from Antiquity to Now," at the Barbican Art Gallery in London. See less