Tracey Emin

UK

Painting · Drawing · Neon · Textile · Installation

Tracey Emin (b. 1963, Croydon, UK) is one of Britain's most significant living artists. Over four decades she has worked across painting, drawing, video, textile, neon, and installation — using her own life as primary material. Her landmark works My Bed (1998) and Everyone I Have Ever Slept With (1995) established her as a defining voice of the YBA generation. In 2026, Tate Modern hosts A Second Life, the largest exhibition of her career, spanning more than 90 works. Emin represented Great Britain at the 52nd Venice Biennale in 2007.

Emin looks to her life for her primary material. With soul-searching candour she probes the construct of the self and the very impulse to create. Her work is about rites of passage, of time and age, and the simple realisation that we are always alone. The most beautiful thing is honesty, even if it is really painful to look at. Art is not a practice for her. It is who she is.