Tracy Emin 20 Years
Nov. 2nd, 2008 09:44 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
leynosI saw Tracy Emin's bed yesterday.
I have to say, I did enjoy the exhibition. It's very easy to dismiss Ms Emin's work. After all, it's often simplistic and crude. One could easily walk through the gallery thinking "I could do that," and be right. In a way. Tracy Emin's work is very definitely a case where the medium is a means to an end. I'm not saying her choice of medium should be ignored. Especially in her beautifully discordant appliqué blankets and sorrowful watercolours. But the point to her work is very much what is being said.
The medium in this case is adjunct to the message in the same way a typeface is an essential component of printed message, but ultimately remains a means to deliver that message.
From what I can see, life has severely shat on Ms Emin, and while I know people who have experiences similarly foul childhoods and misfortunes, it's the case that everyone is unique. Ms Emin's work is the product and distillation of that life. Her art, raw in its display of emotion and humanity is one with her life. It is possessed with an anguish and energy that comes directly from the core of her being.
In my view, we are very fortunate that she has chosen to share these innermost feelings with us, and blessed in this opportunity to share in her catharsis.
I have to say, I did enjoy the exhibition. It's very easy to dismiss Ms Emin's work. After all, it's often simplistic and crude. One could easily walk through the gallery thinking "I could do that," and be right. In a way. Tracy Emin's work is very definitely a case where the medium is a means to an end. I'm not saying her choice of medium should be ignored. Especially in her beautifully discordant appliqué blankets and sorrowful watercolours. But the point to her work is very much what is being said.
The medium in this case is adjunct to the message in the same way a typeface is an essential component of printed message, but ultimately remains a means to deliver that message.
From what I can see, life has severely shat on Ms Emin, and while I know people who have experiences similarly foul childhoods and misfortunes, it's the case that everyone is unique. Ms Emin's work is the product and distillation of that life. Her art, raw in its display of emotion and humanity is one with her life. It is possessed with an anguish and energy that comes directly from the core of her being.
In my view, we are very fortunate that she has chosen to share these innermost feelings with us, and blessed in this opportunity to share in her catharsis.
