Tracey Emin
b. 1963, United Kingdom
Landscape, 2016
Bronze
24 x 63 x 38 cm
Landscape sees one of Tracey Emin’s bronze sculptures taking on the form of a feminine nude, a frequent motif in her repertoire. As the surface of the bronze is indented all over as if it were a piece of hand-moulded clay, the sculpture appears thoroughly imprinted by the human touch. Thus, despite its position as a lone figure, the work presents the sensual picture of a woman marked and shaped by her moments of intimacy with her loved ones. Speaking on this body of work, Emin has said, “[It] is about love and the reflection of love; the desire to melt into the image of someone else, the fantasy of love. There are many different kinds of ways of loving, but as humans we are restricted to the purely physical and never have the confidence to leap into other worlds.” As Emin views her bronzes as three-dimensional approaches to her intensely emotional monoprint drawings, this sculpture sees her delve into concepts surrounding intimacy from a metaphysical standpoint.
Photo: Jack Taylor
Tracey Emin (b. 1963) is an English artist known for her autobiographical and confessional work, with works spanning across numerous mediums such as monoprints, sculpture, and found objects. Drawing from her interest in the works of Edvard Munch and Egon Schiele, Emin’s practice is defined by a raw and unfiltered expressionist take on themes of love, desire, loss, and grief in probing the construct of the self, as she looks to her life events as her primary source of inspiration. Inspired by her friend and collaborator Louise Bourgeois, Emin’s works also carry an explicitly feminist element in their subversion of artistic traditions in portraying feminine identities. Having been appointed Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire (DBE) in 2024 for her contributions to British art, Emin’s works have been exhibited extensively as major exhibitions in the likes of the Royal Academy of Arts, London (2020), Musée d’Orsay, Paris (2019), and the Leopold Museum, Vienna (2015).
