Viewing Tracey Emin: A Second Life

Tracey Emin doesn’t want to call A Second Life, her huge new show at Tate Modern, a retrospective, and indeed, this milestone moment in the artist’s forty-year career reframes the notion of an evolving survey into a life story of transformation, resilience and self-expression, bringing together more than 90 works spanning four decades—paintings, installations, neon texts, video, sculpture and textiles. It is the largest showcase of Emin’s practice to date.

What makes A Second Life particularly interesting is the way it maps Emin’s personal evolution against her artistic development. It doesn’t just present a chronology of famous pieces like My Bed (1998) or Why I Never Became a Dancer (1995); it places them in dialogue with recent works created after her recovery from cancer and major surgery, offering a narrative of survival and renewal. This narrative arc – from early confessional works to mature explorations of illness, vulnerability and the body – makes the exhibition feel less like a catalogue and more like a lived journey.

Emin’s art has long been associated with raw emotional honesty, rebellion and autobiography. She dissolves the barrier between private experience and public art, using her own life – trauma, relationships, family, illness – as material. A Second Life highlights how this confessional approach reshaped contemporary art, challenging what can be depicted and whose stories matter. An unforgettable show.