Tracey Emin My Bed

‘My Bed’ by Tracey Emin is a installation piece created in 1998 and is an incredibly open piece about herself and her emotions at the time of creation, it was created to show her thoughts and feelings but also how they effected the way she lived. ‘Branded’ is an oil painting by Jenny Saville created in 1992 to portray society judgement about larger women. Lastly, ‘Study for a self portrait’ is a triptych painting created in 1980 by Francis Bacon. It conveys his thoughts on his own image and shows the audience how he has aged.

‘My Bed’ by Tracey Emin was created for a Japanese Art Show in 1998 when Emin didn’t have anything prepared. The idea behind the work came from Emin being depressed for two weeks after a breakup and suffering from a
The piece was created to show society’s judgement about larger women and to almost shame the audience for their initial judgements of the weight of women. Saville placed her head in the painting while using another model for the body size which she exaggerated slightly to make a bolder point. In the painting, Saville looks down on the viewer as she is leaning back almost shoving her body into the audiences personal space. This shows that for the viewer, there is nowhere to hide from the true message of the piece as most of the frame is taken up by the subjects body. An example of words branded on her is ‘DECORATIVE’, the words can almost be seen as self harm to her body as it shows how the women who receive this judgement take it on as negative but in this case the subject seems to be proud of what she’s called. This portrays that whatever society says about body type, it doesn’t mean that women shouldn’t be proud of their body size. The subject in the piece looks down on the viewer and could almost be judging them for initially judging her, her face remains neutral further proving that the comments don’t matter to her. Her position also shows her power and confidence, something which is often not shown with larger women and the media. The piece repulses but also attracts the audience in regards to the overall message, they don’t want to acknowledge their judgements but there is no way to escape it. Just like Emin’s piece with ‘My Bed’ the large painting shows truth and suddenly becomes very open about things which are usually never talked about showing confidence within the subject and artist. The subject in the painting is naked and doesn’t cover anything up, again forcing the audience to see the truth. This shows confidence within the painting as Saville is taking a stand against society’s views and almost shames the audience for being