Tracey Emin 'Love is What You Want', Southbank Centre

'Love is what you want' features a span of older and more recent works by the artist Tracey Emin. Starting with her 'blankets' and large wooden structure 'knowing my enemy', the show includes her neon works, film, sculptures, drawings, objects, prints and other various memorabilia.

Admittedly I wasn't quite so sure what to expect from this show. Every move Emin makes is documented and thoroughly reported by the media for the public's perusal, making it unavoidable to gain some sort of subconscious and vague impressions of Emin as a woman and also her work as a famous artist.
 
For this reason I was some what doubtful as to whether I would personally connect with her work, whether the show would have any resounding impressions on me. (Despite my current interest in feminist art, my admiration for Louise Bourgeois and curiosity surrounding art based on the personal life of an artist.)

However I  left the exhibition feeling inspired and with a new sense of loyalty, understanding and sympathy of Emins personal struggles, conveyed with brutal honesty through her work.

Perhaps part of the reason for this new found appreciation is the combination of the various works displayed. If I had only seen certain pieces individually I may not have been so impressed. The compulsive crudity of some pieces is softened by the ironic wit of others, the quiet despair of loneliness is thrown in to another light when compared to the humorous, rambling, heavily dyslexic letters written by the artists father.

It is hard to believe that one person can experience so much trauma, Emins life seems more like a soap opera. Yet, and I think this is what makes her work so successful in connecting with a wider audience, despite the universality of some of the raw emotions displayed, we can still sympathise with her experiences as a person, as a female in our contemporary society, on an intimate level. Some critics may argue that part of the reason Tracey Emin does enjoy success is because we sympathise with her, as opposed to appreciating her artistic skill; but surely in order for us to break through to this intimacy and understanding we have to look through her artwork to gain the emotion beyond it? Yes her life is thoroughly documented independently from her art work, but this would connect with few if it wasn't for her means of communication.

'Love is What You Want' rattles human emotion and, in my opinion, succeeds in intimately clarifying Tracey Emins personal experiences to those who wish to open their minds to her and her work.

Lucian Freud

A video I found on youtube of a rare interview with the late artist Lucian Freud, arguably the greatest realist painter of the 20th and 21st century. An aspect of his work which I respect is its ability to appeal to the wider society, people both involved in 'the art world' and those who are not. In comparison to some contemporary art exhibited today it is uncomplicated and to some degree unambiguous. Is it not enough to just appreciate a piece of artwork purely based on visuals and enjoy portraiture for what it is? (Especially to enjoy it portrayed with such an immensity of skill as demonstrated by Freud.)

This is not to say that Freud's work has no depth, his works are thought provoking, the potential for further meaning is present, but above all over things, for me, they are indulgent.

I think his work will always feel relevant; as individual tastes change, society alters and evolves and styles come in and out of fashion, Freuds' paintings will continue to have relevance.The human figure is (quite literally,) laid bare; flesh and human emotion displayed poetically (not to contradict my earlier statement,) yet subtly.

Below are a small number of quotes I noted from the interview which I found of interest: (Hopefully the quotes can help to partially contextualise some of what I have said here also.)

Freud:
'I'm not very analytical, I mean i'm self questioning but only up to a point. It's Hard to say. It's to do with the days going by...
 I never think about technique in anything, I think it holds you up. I think that if things look wrong or ugly in a way which actually clogs the information or feeling you're trying to convey then obviously you're going about it the wrong way.'

Do you find that (your) different moods effect the way that you paint?

Well I try and keep as calm as I can in ways, on the occasion that things go well I try and recreate circumstances, similar ones, hoping that the results will be similar; but it doesn't of course work. but I often think of what I've eaten or haven't and to do with the number of hours I've slept, all sorts of things.

Do you have aspirations or wishes as to how people react to the work?

No I don't care at all. I hope a lot of people will go. I'm fairly immune to praise and abuse, but there are many few number of people where what they think would count a lot for me.

Do you think of other artists at all when you are hanging an exhibition?

I hardly ever hang them, people are kind enough to help me. I'm rather like a car that seems to be driving along but infact is being quietly pushed by someone else who knows exactly which way to go.

Have you used paintings of the past to maybe solve problems that you have with paintings that you're doing?

Not in a direct way but I go to the National Gallery rather like going to a doctor, for help. It's really to reaffirm my belief in something which in my head cease to be plausible at the time that I go, so I go with a certain urgency.

'If you're painting humans you've got the best subject matter in the world. You can do as much with them as they can do themselves.'


Parts 2-5 of the interview are available on Youtube.

'Interest'

Taken from 'The Debt to Pleasure', written by John Lanchester.

'I'm not sure how interested we should be in the idea of interest. It's such a secular category of mental activity - it implies such an emptying out of content. One can't imagine Dante or Pascal being "interested" in something. Pascal's interest in roulette was a terrifying confrontation with the omnipresent immanence of his creator, a face-to-face interview with God. You would no more ask him if it was "interesting" than you would ask a matador if he was "interested" in bulls, a man in a crow's nest on a windjammer during a gale whether he was "interested" in reefs, a ballet dancer at the apogee of his leap whether he is "interested" in gravity, a whore checking the balance of her savings account whether she is "interested" in men. It's a condition of our banality that we are so interested in things; that we assume that the idea of interest has any force. None of the most important events in our life are "interesting" - birth, copulation, death. A man standing on the edge of the abyss has passed beyond interest in the void. Abyssum abyssum vocat. '

Despite awareness of the overuse of the word 'interest' and its apparent demeaning nature I will hasten to say I intend to use this blog as an area in which to express and explore my current 'interests'. As a first year Fine Art degree student, I feel as though I have only just begun to be properly introduced to 'art' and also 'the arts' as a wider context. Thus to refer to a subject which can be involved within one of these categories as an 'interest' appears to be wholly appropriate; for I am not established in anyway, I can only hope to learn as much as possible through my own motivations and determination as and when opportunities arise. I'd like to record my own findings and where appropriate expand on them. Sometimes these 'findings' may develop into ideas for work, sometimes they may be realisations in themselves, sometimes they may be but thoughts that I have had on any given subject which move in and out of relevance.One thing is certain at least, which is that I am at the beginning of my artistic journey, with many avenues to explore.