Martin Kemp: Structural Intuitions in Art and Science

The theme lecture titling "Structural Intuitions in Art and Science", jointly organized by the China Academy of Art (CAA) and Paragon Book Gallery was held at the CAA's Nanshan Campus on September 24. The lecture was delivered by Martin Kemp, a world-renowned scholar on Renaissance art, a student of Leonardo da Vinci and emeritus professor of art history from the University of Oxford.

Francesco D’Arelli, Director of the Italian Cultural Institute in Shanghai, Yu Xuhong, Member of the Committee of Academy Affairs of the CAA, Director of the Publicity Office and Curator of the CAA Art Museum, Uwe Fleckner, Dean of the School of Arts and Humanities; Yang Siliang, a PhD at the University of Kansas and distinguished professor at the School of Arts and Humanities, representatives from Paragon Book Gallery, and faculties and students form each schools attended the lecture. The lecture was hosted by Fan Baiding, Executive Vice President of the School of Arts and Humanities.

Martin Kemp's lecture

Uwe Fleckner, Dean of the School of Arts and Humanities, addresses the audience

Yang Siliang, distinguished professor at the School of Arts and Humanities, answers a question from the audience

Fan Baiding, Executive Vice President of the School of Arts and Humanities, hosts the lecture

Lecture Overview

The lecture stems from Prof. Kemp's academic research and personal interests. Clues of its academic context can be found in his early articles published on Nature, and are grounded in his obsession with shapes and their relationships since childhood. During the lecture, Prof. Kemp emphasized the intuitively structural analogous relationship between an artist's work and natural forms and how such a relationship was the result of a one-sided influence. Instead, it was rooted in an intuition that transcended language and image. He explained the concept of structural intuition through five aspects: Plato's theory of perception; branching and spiraling; folding, expansion and contraction during the growth process; fluidity in motion; and the true rhetoric. His examples were drawn from contemporary art, geometry in Leonardo da Vinci's art, scientific instruments and imaging, DNA's helix structure, architectural structures, C60's spherical structure, and color studies. Through visual images and exceptionally narrative language, Prof. Kemp revealed to us the mystically interactive relationship between art and science.

Dialogue Session

During the dialogue session, Prof. Yang Siliang defined "intuition" by comparing Eastern and Western perspectives while shedding light on the relationship between art and science from a functional perspective. According to Prof. Yang, Chinese calligraphy, as an epitome of art-science integration, provides keen insights on the internal structure and ideographic framework governing Chinese characters, while drawing comparisons to anthropomorphism in ancient Greek culture.

Q&A Session

Prof. Kemp and Prof. Yang answered to the many questions raised by the enthusiastic crowd. A student present was curious about the shape of the universe and the ultimate purpose behind it and questioned how their art might connect back to Leonardo da Vinci's views on the earth and moon. Prof. Kemp opined that art can bring us to places otherwise unreachable by science and that an artist's creation can transcend the perceivable world. Dean Uwe Fleckner highlighted that calligraphy is a great form of expression that marries science and art seamlessly. Director Francesco D’Arelli took a step ahead by posing a question about Chinese calligraphy. He believes that Chinese calligraphy transcends beyond aesthetic experience and that Chinese characters epitomize "structural intuition". The German philosopher Leibniz believed that Chinese characters could become a universal language through which humankind understand and interpret the world. To answer D’Arelli's question, Prof. Kemp compared Wang Dongling's calligraphy and Andy Goldsworthy's sketches and believed that both artists drew upon nature to achieve the artistic effects in their art.

Francesco D’Arelli, Director of the Italian Cultural Institute in Shanghai, participates in the Q&A session as a guest speaker (middle)