Tracey Emin
Tracey Emin is an English artist known for her autobiographical and confessional artwork. Tracey produces work in a variety of media including drawing, painting, sculpture, film, photography, neon text and sewn appliqué
In 1999, Emin exhibited My Bed, which has become a highly recognized piece of work by the artist. Tracey was shortlisted for the Turner Prize herself and exhibited My Bed at the Tate Gallery.
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There was considerable media attention regarding the apparently trivial and possibly unhygienic elements of the installation, such as yellow stains on the bedsheets, condoms, empty cigarette packets, and a pair of knickers with menstrual stains. The bed was presented as it had been when she had stayed in it for several days, feeling suicidal because of relationship difficulties.
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The idea for My Bed was inspired by a sexual yet depressive phase in the artist's life when she had remained in bed for four days without eating or drinking anything but alcohol. When she looked at the vile, repulsive mess that had accumulated in her room, she suddenly realised what she had created. Emin ardently defended My Bed against critics who treated it as a farce and claimed that anyone could exhibit an unmade bed. To these claims the artist retorted, "Well, they didn't, did they? No one had ever done that before."
Tracey Emin has long had a fascination with the Norwegian expressionist and painter of The Scream, Edvard Munch: in her words, “I’ve been in love with this man since I was eighteen”. In 1998 she even created a haunting video piece filmed at the same Oslo jetty that was the location of many of his well-known works. It is just one example of how, like Munch, she embraces even the most painful experiences to create art.
In her most recent work, Tracey Emin/Edvard Munch: The Loneliness of the Soul, exhibits a range of pieces by both artists which reflect on loneliness. The works by Munch and Emin together present the dark territories and raw emotions that both artists navigate an emerge as a moving exploration of grief, loss and longing.