Tracey Emin sitting in front of ‘My Bed,’ the installation piece that earned her a Turner Prize nomination.
In recent years, Emin has shifted from being an outspoken rebel and provocateur to a respected (and unexpected) pillar of the establishment. This does not mean demand for her artwork has decreased, however, with the majority of Tracey Emin prints selling at auction for between £1,000 and £5,000, and many reaching over £30,000.
She has divided public and critical opinion ever since coming to prominence as part of the Young British Artists in the 1990s, with her wild partying and irreverent conduct often bringing her as much, if not more, media attention than the pieces she created.
But even though Tracey Emin’s behaviour might be less provoking than it once was, her confessional artwork is still designed to shock with its raw, honest portrayal of emotional vulnerability and taboo subjects. Her pieces are almost exclusively inspired by her own life and experiences; to try and understand the art, therefore, it helps to understand the artist.
Below are seven things you may not have known about Tracey Emin.
Free Specialist Print Valuations
Please use the form below to submit images of your print and receive a free, no-obligation valuation from a specialist auctioneer. We will also actively seek the highest offer from our network of private collectors to help you sell your print.
"*" indicates required fields
She Appeared Drunk On Television
Tracey Emin’s appearance on The Death of Painting in 1997 gained her extensive exposure at a time when she was still trying to make a name for herself. The show was a filmed debate organised in response to the rise of conceptual art and the way it seemed to be overtaking traditional pictorial pieces.
Emin arrived drunk for the live debate, then proceeded to spend her time interrupting other people’s points, smoking, swearing, and giggling to herself. Just over halfway through the programme, she stated, “I’m the artist here,” later going on to declare, “You people aren’t relating to me now. You’ve lost me.” She ended her appearance by repeatedly saying she was going to rejoin her friends, ripping off her microphone, and finally stalking off the set.
Many viewed her behaviour as self-entitled attention seeking, though others thought she livened up the debate and provided a much-needed jolt to the established art world.
Her Most Expensive Print Sold For £38,000
These Feelings Were True is a set of lithographs in colours made up of eight Tracey Emin self-portraits. The sequence was sold at auction in June 2021 by Phillips for a hammer price of £38,000, and it remains one of Emin’s most popular prints. The scrawling, jagged intensity of the marks and the limited use of colours are typical of Emin’s style, as is her use of self-portraiture to explore the many complex facets of the self.
In fact, Tracey Emin’s pieces are almost always inspired by her own life, with the artist once claiming: “I realised that I was much better than anything I’d ever made… I was the essence of my work.” Her admirers label this searing, self-searching candour as being brave and trailblazing, though her critics call it self-indulgent and shallow.
These Feelings Were True Sold by Phillips in 2021
She Is Part Of The Young British Artists
The Young British Artists (YBAs) are a loose affiliation of different artists who started exhibiting together in London in the late 1980s. Other members include Damien Hirst, Angus Fairhurst, and Sarah Lucas. They became known for their irreverent ‘shock tactics’, their entrepreneurial ambition, and their wild, provocative lifestyle.
The YBAs rocked the art world and were extensively publicised and criticised; for some, their belief that art could take any form and be made from anything was liberating and revolutionary, but to others, it simply represented an inherent lack of talent. Either way, their impact on the art world cannot be underestimated, and many of their members, such as Emin and Hirst, are now amongst the most celebrated and influential artists around today.
She Is Leaving Her Fortune To The Tracey Emin Foundation
In 2020, Emin made her bladder cancer diagnosis public, and in the years since, she carefully documented her extensive major surgery and long recovery journey. Though she is now cancer free, many of her major organs were removed, and the experience left her with a profound appreciation of life and its shortness. Since then, she has said: “I must live every day as my last.”
Part of that new philosophical outlook involves her decision to leave her London mansion, French villa, significant monetary fortune and all her artwork to the Tracey Emin Foundation. The foundation is her contribution to helping new artists develop their talent and further their careers, and it’s important to her because “love of art is number one” in her life, and she wants to help bring more art into the world.
She Is A Turner Prize Nominee
Tracey Emin’s installation piece, My Bed, was first exhibited in 1999. It earned her a Turner Prize nomination, and beds have been a recurring motif in her work ever since, with prints such as 3.30 Am – Again (2021) selling at auction for £35,000 in 2023.
My Bed caused huge controversy when it was first unveiled to the public due to the numerous provocative items strewn around it, including stained underwear, empty vodka bottles, cigarette packets, and discarded condoms. The artist stated that she spent four days unable to leave her bed during a breakdown, and that once she finally surfaced and saw the “absolute mess and decay of [her] life,” she was inspired to move the bed into a gallery space.
My Bed is lauded by many as an exceptionally daring piece of installation art that unabashedly explores taboo subjects. But it’s also extensively ridiculed and disparaged, including by Emin’s former lover, Billy Childish, who stated that he had one of her old beds in the shed and would be willing to sell it for £20,000. Ironically, My Bed is Emin’s most expensive artwork to date, having been sold by Christie’s at auction for £2.2 million in July 2014.
Tracey Emin
She Destroyed Much Of Her Early Work
In the same vein as Francis Bacon and many other well-known artists, little of Tracey Emin’s early work survives after she took a sledgehammer to it during a period of grief and emotional instability, believing “There was no place in the world for [her] art.”
Because of this, it’s relatively rare to come by Tracey Emin work from the ‘80s and her time at art school, yet the few pieces that survived can fetch very high prices. Two Young Women, for instance, is a 1985 linocut, and it was sold by Bloomsbury Auctions in December 2014 for £24,000.
She Has Been Awarded Numerous Honours
In addition to being a Royal Academician, receiving an honorary doctorate from the University of Kent, and being appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire, Tracey Emin has most recently become a Dame. She received the damehood in 2024 for her services to British art, and although she said it wasn’t something she ever expected, she believes “Dame Tracey has a good ring to it.” The one-time enfant terrible of the YBAs is now clearly, if a little unexpectedly, firmly part of the establishment she once loved to revile.
