Charming the media is one thing.
Impressing real art critics is
another, writes
antonia bland |
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Has Tracey Emin finally been found out? Her latest coup - representing Britain at the Venice Biennale - has earned her still more of the publicity she craves, but also some sober criticism. The erudite critic Richard Dorment, unseduced by her celebrity, calls it "The weakest British entry I've seen in 20 years."
Her neon Angel at the RA's Summer Exhibition, which opened this week, is little better. It is overwhelmed by the work of far greater artists like Anselm Kiefer and, more seriously, eclipsed not only by the work of her fellow RAs, but by much of the amateur dross.
And yet Emin is as canny as ever at charming the media, guiding the television reporters round her Venice instalment like a boastful schoolgirl. In a recent article for the Independent she could barely contain her pleasure at representing Britain at the Biennale, or "the World Cup of art", as she |
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| Emin’s work, Richard Dorment seems to be warning, may not survive comparison on the world stage |
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called it. Nor could she conceal her glee at her newly acquired status as a Royal Academician. On the RA news, she writes, "Ra-ra-ra, a Ra, Ra, RA!"
Anyone who witnessed last night's Summer Exhibition party might reasonably conclude that her appointment to RA was a cynical ploy by a museum seemingly obsessed with celebrity and the need to attract a younger, richer party crowd.
Over the last decade, like Zelig, Emin popped up everywhere, her signature impish grin and Jessica-Rabbit cleavage inescapable, her squinty eyes staring eagerly at the camera. Her work laid her sex life bare - and wasn't difficult to grasp.
From her tent embroidered with the names of Everyone I Have Ever Slept With, shown in 1995, to My Bed, shortlisted for the Turner Prize in 1999, her work always created a media splash - yet, curiously, unlike most art rebels of previous centuries, always under the prestigious wing of a well-known collector (Charles
Saatchi) or gallery (White Cube) or 
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