Yesterday, British artist Tracey Emin premiered her first solo exhibition in Greater China at both Lehmann Maupin and White Cube in Hong Kong. Coinciding with the opening of Art Basel Hong Kong, the exhibition, titled “I Cried Because I Love You,” features Emin’s gestural paintings, neon phrases, and embroidered works, ordered in a specific chronology spanning dual gallery spaces.
A current professor at the Royal Academy of Arts, Emin is known for creating intensely personal and confessional work, with past acclaimed pieces including “Everyone I Have Ever Slept With 1963–1995” (1995), a tent embroidered with the names of platonic and sexual bedmates alike, and “My Bed” (1998), an explosive installation combining the artist’s unmade bed with vodka bottles, bloodstains, and pantyhose. Her current exhibition takes its title from a handwritten scrap of paper she found, and reflects on “the desire to be with someone,” regardless of whether or not the feeling is requited, yet also “the simple realization that we are always alone.” Reflecting a common human loneliness and longing through her own experiences, Enim creates a poignant, immersive show.
The exhibitions will be on view in Hong Kong through May 21.