Tracey Emin

Interview by William Furlong, recorded May 1997

Interview recorded in the South London Gallery during the artist's exhibition 'I Need Art Like I Need God'.

from Audio Arts Magazine Volume 16 Numbers 3 & 4, 1997

Transcript

‘Wigwam Sam’ performed by Tracey Emin aged ten precedes this conversation, which was recorded in the South London Gallery during her exhibition ‘I Need Art Like I Need God’. Emin starts by elaborating on the title of the exhibition and then speaks about a number of works and their references starting with TACI MIN, which comprises an Ouija board on a green baize table and two chairs.

William Furlong: I’m in the South London Gallery with Tracey Emin in her exhibition which is titled I Need Art Like I Need God. Tracey, what does the title mean?

Tracey Emin: I Need Art Like I Need God, basically that’s a declaration to myself and about a couple of years ago I was down in Margate walking along the beach and I had a piece of chalk and instead of writing some sort of usual thing I wrote ‘I need art like I need God’ and that moment I realised that it was probably the truest statement I’d ever made

WF: Is the term ‘God’ in any specific religious sense or is it just a general idea of an omnipotent person and power?

TE: It’s a general idea, God is universal, everybody knows what it means and it’s a very short sharp word which explains a lot of things to a lot of people immediately.

WF: The first work that we’re going to look at is titled TACE MIN which is a Ouiji board with a glass and two chairs; what are the references to this? TE: Well when I was little my Mum and everyone always used to do the Ouiji board or séances every weekend. The other week my Mum and I were looking at this kitchen where they’ve got a very nice 70’s white Formica table where she would do the Ouiji board because the glass would really go fast on it. She said that I used to sit underneath the table; this is just like an obvious thing from my childhood. The red velvet chair, comes from the Theatre Royal in Margate which is a haunted theatre, and the other chair comes from my home, which I’ve had for years and the multi-coloured cardigan belonged to a woman called Vi Player; she’s dead now. The drawings underneath are my drawings of the dead. I blindfolded myself in my museum, got very drunk and thought about the dead people that I knew and then just tried to see what kind of drawings would occur. It was quite scary actually it was originally called Can You Hear Me and the reason why the work is called TACI MIN is because I actually showed something similar when we were in Canada and some friends and I were doing the Ouiji board and it actually came out as TACI MIN. What’s quite interesting is that there isn’t an ‘e’ or an ‘r’ on the boards because for some reason I forgot them.

WF: Spirituality and mysticism are two things you refer to now and again which is almost contrary to another way of describing your work; that of direct experience. Is there a way in which the two things combine?

TE: I think daily life and spirituality should be much closer together.

WF: Not many younger artists talk about areas of spirituality.

TE: Yes I think that’s because my influences in art comes from the beginning of the twentieth century when people were more romantically charged up, were more passionate, more spiritual, and I’ve always been like it and I’m not ashamed of it either, hence I Need Art Like I Need God.

WF: So you talk about being influenced by late nineteenth century, early twentieth century ideas, but can you be a bit more specific about which artists, which periods?

TE: I really like Ibsen, the playwright, Edvard Munch, my favourite painter, Egon Schiele, my favourite drawer and I actually quite like Nietzsche. Edvard Munch, for example, people said that he was a misogynist but the titles for his paintings and the way he thought are actually very feminine and to do with the spirit and nature.

WF: Now we’re just at the edge of this work which I believe is called Swedish Room – Exorcism of the Last Painting I Ever Made, it’s a reconstruction of a space in a gallery in Stockholm where you closed yourself into this room and painted naked, but people could look in through small holes.

TE: Yes, there were about twelve peepholes down one wall and eight on another, so there was nowhere where I could be private and I was naked, you mustn’t forget that.

WF: Why you were naked?

TE. It’s called Exorcism and the project was called Exorcism of the Last Painting I Ever Made and because all the art stuff was going well, the sewing things were going good, the sculptures, the writing, I was happy with art, the only thing that really did my head in was painting. It just completely fucked me up. When I was pregnant I stopped painting and I stopped making art for a couple of years. So I decided to go to Sweden and do this painting project and if I could make one good painting then I would have forgiven myself for the termination, for giving up art and for all my failures. So that’s the most important thing with this room. It’s about my experience, the transformation for me at the time.

TE: Why was I naked that was your question wasn’t it? It was because I had a loathing of my physical body and if I had a choice I wouldn’t have a physical body, I’d just be some kind of floating soul. I felt weighted down by it and also physically I didn’t feel very attractive. I’ve always hated my tits and always hated my genitals. I’m also afraid of the dark and afraid of being alone. When I was in Sweden I slept alone in the gallery, it was a very big gallery in a very old building. I was naked during the day so I had to get over my hang-ups about my body and I also had to get over my hang-overs, yes definitely my hang-overs. I had to get over my hang-ups about being in the dark and being alone, and my hang-ups about painting and my hang-ups about having this termination; I really gave myself two and a half weeks of a mini hell.

WF: The painting was a way out of it, is that what you’re saying?

TE: Yeah, because when I first took my robe off, when I became naked, I thought ‘Oh my God’ and then when I first picked up a brush I thought ‘you stupid cow what are you doing?’ Luckily I had a mobile phone so I was ringing people up and crying saying ‘I’ve made a really big mistake’.

WF: Doesn’t being naked also make reference to the experience of art school where you have naked models, who are passive?

TE: Yes of course, because I know for the people looking through the eyeholes, they were the artists, actually looking through the fish lenses, I know that I looked like a life model gone mad, because a lot of the figurative paintings were obviously of myself, so people related my body with the painting. That was the idea behind it. The other thing is that I worked through my personal history of painting. I started with the Edvard Munch ‘Scream’ and I worked up to the Egon Schiele, I did an exceptionally bad Picasso painting and realised that I had a deep hatred for Picasso. I did some Velasquezs, I did some fantastic Yves Kleins, well I did some crap Yves Kleins. It was quite amusing, when people came to the gallery I had no idea whether there was one person, a hundred people or no people. When I started doing the Yves Kleins, I painted my hand, pressed it on one canvas, it worked. I took my jewellery off, I’d mixed up a big pot of blue and then I just started to paint my body. Apparently, the gallery attendant said that there was one person at that time looking through the spy hole and there were about forty people in the gallery and this one person went ‘she’s doing an Yves Klein’ and people just started manically running and fighting over the spy holes, and I ended up doing about eight.

WF: Didn’t you feel very vulnerable and exposed?

TE: At one point I started crying really badly and I suddenly thought ‘Oh God someone could see my crying’ but it was too late.

WF: A lot of your work is to do with vulnerability and exposure and you were doing it in reality there?

TE: That’s the other thing about being naked; it’s not that I have nothing to hide; I really have nothing.

WF: But you do it metaphorically in the accounts you write about your early life and Margate.

TE: Yeah I do, so it was quite an experience for me to do it with my physical flesh.

WF: Can you say a bit more about what a good painting is for you?

TE: It’s got to be aesthetically pleasing, it’s got to have some strong meaning behind it and it’s got to be something that I can live with.

WF: When you went to Sweden did you have a master plan or did it just evolve?

TE: I had a master plan but the bit I didn’t know was what the paintings would look like. My master plan was actually to burn and destroy everything immediately afterwards, but I was so confused because I’d had such an emotional experience, alone and painting, that I wasn’t ready to destroy everything.

WF: You’ve already done that in your history haven’t you?

TE: Yes actually I’ve already done that once and it would be very foolish to go and do that again and that’s the whole metaphor for the abortion thing.

WF: This is the opposite this is reconstruction.

TE: Yes, exactly so it’s quite positive really isn’t it?

WF: You’ve kind of adopted the kind of languages of the artists you’ve referred to, but you’ve imposed your own kind of content and life over these haven’t you? TE: Yes, well this one, it’s probably quite a pretty painting, this one was ‘Cum International’ and it’s that I want to fuck the world, that was yesterday but today I just want to die. The painting lasted over a week because it’s painted over and over again with different words.

WF: Yes that’s got an abstract expressionist feel, hasn’t it?

TE: Yes it certainly has. The drips really look like sperm as well, don’t you think?

WF: Yes, and you’ve got the Yves Klein one next to it.

TE: Yes, it’s sad really, I don’t know why I ran to the canvas with my arms out as if I’m about to be shot in the back, but they almost look like joke Yves Kleins.

WF: They continue something that recurs in a lot of your drawings which is this issue to do with the body, about trying to explore your identity through your own body.

TE: One interesting thing since Sweden is that I’ve actually changed the shape of my body; I’ve lost a lot of weight and I’m much more upright. My spiritual starting point was my Jonathon Livingstone seagull poster from my Mum’s bathroom, which says something like ‘if you really love something, set it free, if it comes back you know it’s yours, if it doesn’t you know that it never was’. That was the first thing I put up on the wall.

WF: Tell us about this piece called Montenegro with little tanks located around the map of the world?

TE: Yes, the tanks are me, they’re Emins and the reason why it’s called Montenegro is because it’s from the film Montenegro, when the girl does the erotic dance with the remote control tank. Well I’d love to do that dance. There are these little flags made out of plasticine, toothpicks and masking tape and bits of cloth which have got mono-printed names of most of my friends and people that I know and I’ve placed them strategically in different parts of the world. There’s a funny one, it’s very childish but Frieze magazine is in Iceland.

WF: This was on the front cover of the current Frieze magazine.

TE: Yes it’s my favourite art magazine. I’ve put my friends that take tons of coke in Columbia, I won’t mention their names. Then other friends I’ve sent on holiday; they need a break. Then I’ve got a friend who’s always really stoned so I’ve put him in Afghanistan and, Sadie Cole, she always drinks for the Atlantic, so I’ve put her in the middle of the Atlantic. They’re really like silly things, so it’s very childish.

WF: What about the flags with the match sticking out as the turret, which is you?

TE: I think it speaks for itself really doesn’t it? But it’s quite tongue in cheek, that elitist thing about me taking over. It’s just like a toy and it’s a cardboard tank it’s not going to hurt anyone is it?

WF: Here’s some personal memorabilia, and a faxed letter from your father, who’s a Turkish Cypriot; has that affected you in terms of identity?

TE: Yes I’m certainly not the Anglo-Saxon woman am I? My Great Great Grandfather was from Sudan; he was African. I know people think going back to your roots is a boring pastime but it’s actually quite important to me. I did it when I was younger because it answered lots of questions; Why am I so fiery? Why am I so vibrant? It’s because I’m not tame English girl, I’ve got a wildness that’s definitely hard core Mediterranean.

WF: Another thing that comes to the surface more and more in your work is about your relationships with other people. Looking at your film, that was made at Niagara Falls, where you talked a lot about the positive charge you got from the friendships of Georgina and Louise and Jane Wilson. Other people seem very important to you?

TE: I’m thirty three and I think it’s probably the first time in my life that I actually feel confident about friendships and I realise that a lot of my life I’ve been quite lonely. I still am on the outside but I recognise that in other people too and we all cling together and have a really good time. Niagara was really important to me because I was going through a hard time and I felt very safe and secure with those people. That little film is like a celebration of that really. I meant to show you my blanket, because this really relates to what we were just talking about.

WF: Could you describe it, as people won’t be able to see it?

TE: It’s a turquoise blue, industrial type blanket, it’s two actually sewn together, and it’s about 8ft. by 8ft. On it is appliquéd stitching with different fabrics and words., it’s called ‘Mad Tracey from Margate’. I’ll read out some of the sentences, at the top in red it says ‘Yeah we’ve all been there’ and next to it it says ‘heaven’. All the fabrics in the blanket are made up from my friends’ clothing, because I’ve done so much sewing I’ve run out of what I call ‘sacred fabrics’, fabrics that really mean something. I use my own clothes; my parents’ clothes and I’ve just run out. I wanted to make this sewing piece so I asked all my friends to give me a piece of clothing. There’s only one mistake actually, someone gave me a pair of Portsmouth trousers to actually sew on a button for them and I completely misunderstood and cut them up. That’s the only mistake I made in all of this.

WF: Where do the texts come from, you were going to read a few?

TE: Yes I am, I wish I had my glasses on, ‘She’s heading towards the sunset shouting yee ha all the way’ that’s like the future, I’m going to learn to ride a horse this summer and I’m going to Texas in the winter and I want to be riding across the desert shouting ‘Yee Ha’, that’s my fantasy. In the middle of the blanket it says, ‘she was masturbating’ but I’ve spelt masturbating wrong, it’s spelt masterbating, which people thought I’d done intentionally, and that also coincides with like the ego-based thing as well as the whole piece of work. The there’s ‘I’ll always love you’ for example, which is sewn onto a Carl Friedman shirt, and his initials are sewn onto his own fabric, who else? There’s a really good gay friend of mine and on his shirt I’ve put ‘Yeah, I’ll have your baby’, because he’s definitely the best candidate at the moment. Most of my friends gave me really nice things from like Eastern shirts to shirts from Jermyn Street to furs, a really nice fake fur coat. I liked the clothes so much I couldn’t cut them up so this is why the photographs are here.

WF: This is a whole sequence of photographs of you dressing and undressing.

TE: In my friends clothes yes. Also that idea of ‘I’ve got the shirt off his back’ and I’ve got a reputation of actually feeling men’s’ clothes, only because I want the smell of men I’ve had relationships with, I never have one night stands. I loved when friends hadn’t washed the stuff because I could smell them, that was nice, comforting. Now ‘Love Poems’.

WF: We’re standing in front of it. Can you read it?

TE: Yes, I know it off by heart anyway. ‘You put your hand across my mouth, but still the knives continue, every part of my body is screaming, I’m lost, about to be smashed into thousand million pieces, each part forever belonging to you’.

WF: Was it written specifically for somebody?

TE: Yeah, it was written for Carl actually when I was in Geneva. My heart was actually breaking; I was missing him so much. Me and Carl have split up now so this piece of work is called For Carl, 1993 – 1996.

WF: Do you write a lot of poetry?

TE: Yes I write lots of love poetry but I don’t often get the chance to show it in great big pink neon lighting; it’s quite a challenge, technically.

WF: But actual writing still remains fundamental?

TE: All artists have a kind of background thing, and mine is writing, if I don’t write there isn’t going to be any art, it’s that simple.

WF: You said that eventually you’d hoped you would live by the sea and be a writer.

TE: Yes, my dream yeah. Through art I might manage to be able to do that mightn’t I?