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Artist Tracey Emin's Apparition Sighting(s)

blessmycottonsocks

blessmycottonsocks

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blessmycottonsocks said:
Today's Guardian features an interview with artist Tracey Emin.
She tells of her traumatic recovery from cancer surgery and an encounter with a "black apparition".
If you click the hyperlink through to her earlier article, she also saw the ghost of her dead cat.

https://www.theguardian.com/artandd...host-apparition-new-life-margate-cancer-nudes
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It's hard to take at face value, the word of someone who, straight faced, sold a rumpled sleeping bag as 'art' for a considerable sum of money.
 
I remember watching her on Have I Got News For You many years ago (it would have to be, I haven't watched more than the very occasional episode since Angus Deayton got ambushed). She came across as, um, not too bright, completely out of her depth, with the other participants running rings around her. Truly cringe-inducing. And her "art" was just taking the piss, a way to relieve the even-more-stupid of vast sums of money - I do wonder if she was involved in a class war (take the rich for everything you can get).
 
SimonBurchell said:
And her "art" was just taking the piss, a way to relieve the even-more-stupid of vast sums of money - I do wonder if she was involved in a class war (take the rich for everything you can get).
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To be blunt, if that was her intention, you can see the motivation, especially as an alternative to dead-end jobs. I just don't respect it.
 
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blessmycottonsocks said:
My thoughts after reading the article were whether the traumatic effects of a serious illness like cancer, or the harrowing aftermath of major surgery could make you more susceptible to seeing ghosts.
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From the article, it seems she saw the apparition before she was ill, and she viewed it as a premonition.
 
blessmycottonsocks said:
Today's Guardian features an interview with artist Tracey Emin.
She tells of her traumatic recovery from cancer surgery and an encounter with a "black apparition".
If you click the hyperlink through to her earlier article, she also saw the ghost of her dead cat.

https://www.theguardian.com/artandd...host-apparition-new-life-margate-cancer-nudes
Click to expand...
Not blaming you or anything but this is the entire sum total of the ghost sighting from that long article:-
It was light, I was sitting in my living room waiting to look out the window and the TV was on – and suddenly it went off, the room went completely dark, and this apparition came towards me.
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Is that it?! What did it look like? What happened next? Bit frustrating! :)
{I quite like Tracey Emin though..)
 
Min Bannister said:
Not blaming you or anything but this is the entire sum total of the ghost sighting from that long article:-

Is that it?! What did it look like? What happened next? Bit frustrating! :)
{I quite like Tracey Emin though..)
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I agree that the black apparition and ghost cat were fairly slim Fortean pickings after ploughing through those two fairly long articles.
Thought it was worth posting though, due to Ms. Emin's reasonably high profile and because it appeared to link suffering from a serious illness and/or the pain and trauma of recovering from major surgery, with seeing something supernatural - almost like a milder form of an out-of-body-experience.
 
SimonBurchell said:
I think her painting illustrated in the article is much better than the stuff she used to churn out - and at least it involved some skill and effort.
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I think you have to be quite a talented artist in order to 'subvert the norms' (ie, sell an unmade bed as art). You don't get accepted to art school or your own exhibitions for just throwing a load of crap together - well, not generally. You have to show a degree of conventional talent too. A bit like Les Dawson's 'playing the piano badly' act, it only really works if you can play the piano well to start with.

I have no real opinion on Emin, one way or the other, but I do know that she has an artistic talent.
 
As someone who recently had surgery (oh you never mentioned it before Twigs...) and had a morphine pump for pain relief, I can say that I saw some weird stuff on the ward afterwards for quite a few days with my eyes closed. When I closed my eyes I could still 'see' the ward, bed curtains etc but it was now occupied with an older era of nursing staff and at one point a small boy crouching at the foot of my bed staring at me. Even the ward layout was different, and the whole experience was like a very vivid, even lucid, waking dream to the point I got confused when the real ward didnt match the behind closed eyes one. Very strange.
 
catseye said:
I think you have to be quite a talented artist in order to 'subvert the norms' (ie, sell an unmade bed as art). You don't get accepted to art school or your own exhibitions for just throwing a load of crap together - well, not generally. You have to show a degree of conventional talent too. A bit like Les Dawson's 'playing the piano badly' act, it only really works if you can play the piano well to start with.

I have no real opinion on Emin, one way or the other, but I do know that she has an artistic talent.
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I like some of Emin's work, to the degree that I have a few of her prints.

We have this one on our bedroom wall. I should have bought more than one at the Arnolfini Gallery in Bristol on its release (as I was tempted to), when it cost £50. And the same print has since sold for $2500.

https://www.artsy.net/artwork/tracey-emin-my-heart-is-with-you-always-78
 
blessmycottonsocks said:
Today's Guardian features an interview with artist Tracey Emin.
She tells of her traumatic recovery from cancer surgery and an encounter with a "black apparition".
If you click the hyperlink through to her earlier article, she also saw the ghost of her dead cat.

https://www.theguardian.com/artandd...host-apparition-new-life-margate-cancer-nudes
Click to expand...
I read that and must admit I didn't take it as a literal "ghost". More like she was talking about a feeling.
 
catseye said:
I think you have to be quite a talented artist in order to 'subvert the norms' (ie, sell an unmade bed as art). You don't get accepted to art school or your own exhibitions for just throwing a load of crap together - well, not generally. You have to show a degree of conventional talent too. A bit like Les Dawson's 'playing the piano badly' act, it only really works if you can play the piano well to start with.

I have no real opinion on Emin, one way or the other, but I do know that she has an artistic talent.
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Must admit I have always loved her. Kicked myself I didn't have that tent idea.
 
TangletwigsDeux said:
As someone who recently had surgery (oh you never mentioned it before Twigs...) and had a morphine pump for pain relief, I can say that I saw some weird stuff on the ward afterwards for quite a few days with my eyes closed. When I closed my eyes I could still 'see' the ward, bed curtains etc but it was now occupied with an older era of nursing staff and at one point a small boy crouching at the foot of my bed staring at me. Even the ward layout was different, and the whole experience was like a very vivid, even lucid, waking dream to the point I got confused when the real ward didnt match the behind closed eyes one. Very strange.
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I had a similar experience when on a morphine pump. For a few days everywhere I looked was a white blank wall, I saw nothing else. I actually thought I was dead and remember thinking how boring death was.
 
PeteS said:
I had a similar experience when on a morphine pump. For a few days everywhere I looked was a white blank wall, I saw nothing else. I actually thought I was dead and remember thinking how boring death was.
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Huh. I went to sleep. But then I'd been on 4 hours sleep a night for about 8 months and in constant pain.
 
catseye said:
I think you have to be quite a talented artist in order to 'subvert the norms' (ie, sell an unmade bed as art). You don't get accepted to art school or your own exhibitions for just throwing a load of crap together - well, not generally. You have to show a degree of conventional talent too. A bit like Les Dawson's 'playing the piano badly' act, it only really works if you can play the piano well to start with.
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Emin was a painter in art school and burned all her paintings after graduating. I think she's a pretty good artist FWIW, certainly more substantial than Damien Hirst or most of those other YBAs. Interesting my dad who would usually have hated everything she stood for always had a soft spot for Tracey Emin because she was, like him, from Thanet and there was an element of local pride for him.

I think that a lot of people's dislike for 'contemporary art' is to do with misunderstanding over the intention or the definition of 'art'. For some people, technical ability or quality is the factor that makes something 'art' or 'not art'. For others, the 'cultural context' of the artwork (for want of a better term) has the same purpose. Both are valid definitions and don't have to be mutually exclusive - plenty of words have multiple definitions. Contemporary artists are essentially playing games with culture or philosophy*, which is interesting for some and not for others, but shouldn't be dismissed out of hand. To judge their output based on its beauty, technical quality, or ability to accurately visually represent a subject is like trying to judge a cat in a dog show - irrelevant.

*wish I could explain this better, I'll have a think about it.
 
James_H said:
I think that a lot of people's dislike for 'contemporary art' is to do with misunderstanding over the intention or the definition of 'art'. For some people, technical ability or quality is the factor that makes something 'art' or 'not art'. For others, the 'cultural context' of the artwork (for want of a better term) has the same purpose. Both are valid definitions and don't have to be mutually exclusive - plenty of words have multiple definitions. Contemporary artists are essentially playing games with culture or philosophy*, which is interesting for some and not for others, but shouldn't be dismissed out of hand. To judge their output based on its beauty, technical quality, or ability to accurately visually represent a subject is like trying to judge a cat in a dog show - irrelevant.
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I know what you mean but I think she probably gets judged a lot on the bed or the tent by people who just thought they were a bed and a tent. I went to see an exhibition of hers at the Tate Modern years ago and got an entirely different perspective. She IS a talented artist. And personally I loved the tent (although I never saw it in real life). Every so often I think about what my tent would look like. I don't even know if I would be able to count the people I have slept with given the number of times I have shared a room with strangers in youth hostels and so on. Plus her applique stuff is really good as well so why wouldn't have it been good just aesthetically, never mind as something to make you think?
 
Min Bannister said:
I know what you mean but I think she probably gets judged a lot on the bed or the tent by people who just thought they were a bed and a tent. I went to see an exhibition of hers at the Tate Modern years ago and got an entirely different perspective. She IS a talented artist. And personally I loved the tent (although I never saw it in real life). Every so often I think about what my tent would look like. I don't even know if I would be able to count the people I have slept with given the number of times I have shared a room with strangers in youth hostels and so on. Plus her applique stuff is really good as well so why wouldn't have it been good just aesthetically, never mind as something to make you think?
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There are plenty of people who said Picasso was rubbish. HE also painted conventional pictures, not just the cubist stuff, it wasn't just a question of 'ladies with all their features on one side of their faces'. I teach writing, and one of things I teach is that you have to know what the norms are, and be able to do them well, before you can subvert them. Because subverting the norms when you don't have a good grasp of the basics (or norms) isn't 'groundbreaking', it's usually 'rubbish'.
 
I personally do not understand modern art at all. But I understand that it would be ignorant of me to call something shite because I don't understand it.

And my motivation to get to understand it is missing,so I keep my gob shut.
 
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