“The papers are always going to pick on me. It does make me think sometimes why do I still live in this country?” Come on now, who on reading that could deny a reaction of, “well please, don’t stay on my account”?
So yes, I do have a problem with Emin, and I don’t think I’m alone. Am I being sexist? That’s a difficult one to answer. Certainly I would be equally unenthusiastic about a male equivalent of Emin’s bed, with crumpled Kleenex tissues….well, let’s not go there. I suppose some sort of defence of Emin might be mounted on the idea of her art as confessional and personal, and therefore uncomfortable to the average male, but I don’t buy it. If art is just about confession and therapy then it’s not much use as art.
If the British public is showing its philistinism, well, good for them. Since Tate Britain now has a whole room devoted to Emin, it’s clear that the art world no longer has any criteria for deciding what’s good art and what’s bad art beyond what creates column inches in the media, and assumes idiotically that what’s hated now will inevitably become the classic of the future – but it ain’t going to happen with Emin. She’s iconic, but for all the wrong reasons. She’ll be famous for showing, finally, that the art world has disappeared up its arse.
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