Living with Leonardo: Fifty Years of Sanity and Insanity in the Art World and Beyond

by Martin Kemp

Overview

Approaching the 500th anniversary of Leonardo’s death, the world- renowned da Vinci expert recounts his fifty- year journey with the work of the world’s most famous artist

A personal memoir interwoven with original research, Living with Leonardo takes us deep inside Leonardo da Vinci scholar Martin Kemp’s lifelong passion for the genius who has helped define our culture.

Each chapter considers a specific work as Kemp offers insight into his encounters with academics, collectors, curators, devious dealers, auctioneers, and authors— as well as how he has grappled with legions of “Leonardo loonies,” treaded vested interests in academia and museums, and fended off fusillades of non- Leonardos. Kemp explains his thinking on the Last Supper and the Mona Lisa, retells his part in the identification of the stolen Buccleuch Madonna, and explains his involvement on the two major Leonardo discoveries of the last 100 years: La Bella Principessa and Salvator Mundi. His engaging narrative elucidates the issues surrounding attribution,the scientific analyses that support experts’ interpretations, and the continuing importance of connoisseurship.

Illustrated with the works being discussed, Living with Leonardo explores the artist’s genius from every angle, including technical analysis and the pop culture works he inspired, such as The Da Vinci Code, and his enduring influence 500 years after his death.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780500239568
Publisher:	Thames & Hudson
Publication date:	05/01/2018
Pages:	288
Product dimensions:	6.40(w) x 9.30(h) x 1.30(d)

About the Author

Martin Kemp is emeritus research professor in the history of art at Oxford University. He is a leading authority on Leonardo da Vinci and his bibliography on the artist includes Leonardo; Leonardo da Vinci: Experience, Experiment, Design; and La Bella Principessa: The Story of the New Masterpiece by Leonardo da Vinci.

Table of Contents

Author's Note 6

Introduction: Art History in Action 8

Prologue: A Sketch of Leonardo 13

1 The Last Supper and the First Steps 24

2 The 'Original' Last Supper 54

3 Looking at Lisa 70

4 The Stolen Madonna 102

5 The Beautiful Princess 136

6 Ugly Arguments 158

7 The Saviour 184

8 Science and Seeing 210

9 Codices and Computers 236

10 Exhibitions 254

11 Codes and Codswallop 280

Note on Sources 309

Picture Credits 311

Acknowledgments 312

Index 314

Editorial Reviews

03/12/2018
Kemp, emeritus professor of the history of art at Oxford University, serves up a stimulating collection of observations regarding da Vinci and his major works that is both deeply personal and speaks to the enduring interest in the artist’s legacy. The bulk of the book homes in on specific paintings that are the linchpins of da Vinci’s career. A pair of chapters on The Last Supper deal with controversial restorations of the crumbling masterpiece and address the difficulties that modern professionals face approaching such tasks with “a period eye.” Kemp notes how da Vinci “poured his visual knowledge and human understanding” into the Mona Lisa and discusses how da Vinci strove to surpass the achievements of Renaissance poetry by visualizing ideal beauty. Kemp, who has studied da Vinci’s work for over half a century, writes with authority and makes esoteric minutiae accessible to the layman, especially in chapters concerned with modern scientific tools including X-rays, infrared reflectography, and microscopy used to establish the attribution and authenticity of paintings. He also demystifies the process by which exhibitions are mounted and writes with bemused tolerance of the “secretology” fad of finding hidden meanings in art inspired by Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code. His book is an instructive appreciation of the Renaissance master suited for readers with a general interest in the artist’s works as well as those well-versed in the scholarship on this subject. 80 illus. (May)

Publishers Weekly

"Kemp has spent a lifetime studying and writing about the most famous and enigmatic figure in the history of Western art [and] now presents ‘an account of [his] personal relationship with Leonardo da Vinci,’ skillfully combining that story with assessments and analyses of several of the artist’s most iconic works, including The Last Supper, Mona Lisa, and the recently sold Salvator Mundi… As Kemp writes, ‘Leonardo inspires studious devotion and untrammeled fantasy in equal measure.’ Devotees, including ‘Leonardo loonies,’ will appreciate this fascinating account."

Booklist

2018-02-20
A scholar looks back on a long career studying Leonardo da Vinci's life and works.Kemp (Emeritus, History of Art/Oxford Univ.; Art in History: 600 BC-2000 AD, 2015, etc.), who has published several books on Leonardo, is a leading expert. With the 500th anniversary of Leonardo's death approaching, the author offers a wide-ranging and insightful account of his "personal relationship" with Leonardo over the past 50 years, which involves "people, institutions, events and skulduggery." After a succinct and handy biography of the artist, Kemp devotes two chapters to "one of the colossuses of world culture," The Last Supper. He first encountered the painting, or what then "remained" of it, in 1964. It was "momentous," Kemp writes, but he was bothered by the "pictorial wreckage" the work had suffered over the years; the "actual painting refused to thrill." The author is excellent in his analyses of Leonardo's artistic "intention of the mind," his desire to capture the painting's "soul." No "previous artist was as concerned with such deep causes." Kemp's discussion of the pros and cons of the latest restoration efforts is superb. Then it's on to Mona Lisa and the unique opportunity he had to view the work unencumbered by its usual special wood and glass casing: "Its sense of presence is truly uncanny. It is alive." Next up is the lively story of the 2003 theft of Madonna of the Yarnwinder from a Scottish castle and its recovery in 2007. The knotty issue of authenticity is confronted in two pieces on La Bella Principessa, followed by one on the exciting 2008 discovery of the Salvator Mundi. The final essays deal with the development of a CD-ROM for Leonardo's 72-page Codex Leicester, the ups and downs of curating exhibitions, and Kemp's thoughts on Dan Brown's "fictional history," The Da Vinci Code.Sign up for these informative, witty, and opinionated art history classes.

Kirkus Reviews