Walking into “I Followed you to the End,” Tracey Emin’s latest exhibition at White Cube Bermondsey, feels like stepping into the raw core of human experience. Her paintings and sculptures are not just works of art; they are visceral confessions, revelations born out of love, pain, and deep existential reflection. The exhibition is not a meticulously planned project but rather the culmination of a continuous, instinctive process. As Emin herself put it, “I don’t work towards an exhibition. I just work all the time… painting and working, painting and working.” The words “I followed you to the end” emerged, unbidden, from the same emotional urgency that fills the exhibition space, capturing the relentless pursuit of love, no matter the cost.
A Deeply Personal Journey Unfolds at White Cube Bermondsey
Emin‘s deeply personal journey through the intertwined forces of life and death imbues the exhibition with an undeniable spiritual intensity. “I followed you to the end of life, and where is the end of life?” she muses, as she recalls a haunting vision of a bridge, representing the threshold between life and death, that has pervaded her dreams since her youth. “Because I am not scared of dying, and because I confronted death, it’s something that has always been within me,” Emin reveals. This fearlessness translates into her work, where the blurred boundary between life and death is explored with both vulnerability and power. The recurring motif of the bridge connects her past and present, merging her physical and psychological worlds. Each brushstroke becomes a meditation on transcendence and transformation, an attempt to find solace and meaning in the face of mortality.
The expressive force of Tracey Emin’s work lies not only in the physicality of her brushstrokes but also in the deeply personal narratives that permeate each piece. In I Followed you to the End (2024), the titular painting of the exhibition, the artist’s raw reflection on the complexities of love is both heartbreaking and cathartic. The solitary female figure, swathed in crimson and black, is a witness to her own suffering—a figure who has “followed love to the end” only to be abandoned. The handwritten text on the canvas is a direct indictment of those who have hurt her: “You made me like this. All of you—each of you in your individual way.” Emin’s unflinching honesty reverberates throughout the gallery, challenging the viewer to confront the pain that love and devotion can sometimes yield.
Tracey Emin, “I Followed You to the End,” 2024. © White Cube © Tracey Emin.
“I don’t work towards an exhibition. I just work all the time… painting and working,”
—Tracey Emin
Tracey Emin Proposes Beauty in Pain, and Celebrating Survival
Her exploration of death and rebirth is further intensified by her own personal journey with cancer. Diagnosed with aggressive bladder cancer in 2020, Emin’s life took a dramatic turn. Major surgery followed, and with it came a stoma—a daily reminder of her brush with mortality. She confronts this in the candid film displayed in the exhibition, offering an intimate glimpse into her life. “When you have a stoma, sometimes it bleeds… My stoma keeps me alive, keeps me here, this blood that is flowing is my blood and it’s mine,” she reflects, seeing beauty even in the pain of her condition. By making her stoma an image in her work, Emin emphasizes the fragility of life while also celebrating survival, transforming a subject often hidden into a symbol of resilience.
Installation image. “I Followed you to the End’ by Tracey Emin by White Cube. © White Cube © Tracey Emin.
Tracey Emin Invests in Art and Community in Margate
Living and working in Margate, Emin has found new purpose, both in her art and her community. Margate, a place deeply embedded in her personal history, has now become the center of her renewed creative energy. “Every time I come on a motorway from Margate to London, I go over the Rochester bridge… It is really a place from death to life,” she recalls. Her connection to this town is both literal and metaphorical, as it serves as a backdrop for her journey between past and present, life and death. Emin’s dedication to the town extends beyond her own work—she founded an art school and artist studios in Margate, investing in the next generation of artists. “I love art more than anything. I would love to have a Munch painting, but instead, I have an art school and artist studios. That’s what I spend my money on, because I believe in art,” she shares, revealing her commitment to art as a vital force in society.
Through her philanthropic efforts, Emin is not just giving back to her community—she is fostering a space where creativity can flourish, regardless of barriers. “We are literally showing people what art can do and how it can make a difference,” she says, reflecting on the diverse group of students who now benefit from her initiative. Emin’s belief in art as a transformative power is unwavering, and her passion for ensuring its future is palpable. “If we don’t have art at schools, you will have riots on the streets,” she warns, underscoring the necessity of art in our cultural and social landscape. For Emin, art is not just a career; it is a way of living, breathing, and connecting with the world.
Tracey Emin, “Another Place to Live,” 2024. © White Cube © Tracey Emin.
“I love art more than anything. I would love to have a Munch painting, but instead, I have an art school and artist studios. That’s what I spend my money on, because I believe in art,”
Tracey Emin
Emin’s current work moves beyond the canvas to address intimate confrontations with mortality and existence, as seen in works like My Dead Body – A Trace of Life (2024), where a female figure lies motionless, underscoring themes of decay and stillness. The second canvas in the diptych reveals a poignant statement: “I don’t want to have sex because my body feels dead.” This work, along with I Kept Crying (2024), where the crucifix-like taps in a bathtub suggest a burial, transforms the private spaces of her figures into metaphorical tombs. The fusion of physical decay and emotional barrenness reflects Emin’s own reckoning with illness and survival.
Invoking a Spiritual Essence and Pushing Past Boundaries in Art and Life
A spiritual essence pervades the exhibition, blurring the line between the living and the dead. In Take Me to Heaven (2024), a figure seems to drift into another realm, accompanied by a spectral presence that symbolically represents Emin’s late mother. The thin veil between life and death is rendered through layers of paint, some figures obscured as if emerging from the beyond. Similarly, Time to Go (2024), with its red sails evoking Charon’s boat from Greek mythology, invokes imagery of passage to the underworld. Emin’s ability to push boundaries remains central to her work, whether through the raw emotional intensity of her pieces or her exploration of the transcendental. Her sculptures, including Ascension (2024), capture the same energy—Emin’s hand imprints on the bronze surfaces invite an intimacy with the viewer, reminding us that life and art are always interconnected.
The significance of painting in Emin’s practice cannot be overstated. After years of exploration in various mediums, she has returned to the art form with a renewed sense of purpose. “It took me time to get to the top of my mountain… to understand what is really important to me, and that is painting,” she explains. Her canvases are not merely visual objects; they are extensions of her emotional landscape, capturing the “spiritual” journey she continues to navigate. “I need it in my work to give myself some sort of solace and understanding of who I am as I get older,” she reflects, making it clear that for her, painting is both a personal and existential act.
Installation image. “I Followed you to the End’ by Tracey Emin by White Cube. © White Cube © Tracey Emin.
“It took me time to get to the top of my mountain… to understand what is really important to me, and that is painting,”
—Tracey Emin
Tracey Emin’s exhibition ‘I followed you to the end’ is an embodiment of her unyielding commitment to honesty, vulnerability, and the power of art. Whether through the haunting figures on her canvases, the brutal intimacy of her stoma film, or the monumental sculptures that dominate the gallery space, Emin invites us to witness her journey—one that encompasses love, loss, survival, and ultimately, rebirth. In a world increasingly driven by materialism and superficiality, Emin’s work serves as a reminder of art’s capacity to connect us with our most profound emotions, to confront our deepest fears, and to offer a glimpse of transcendence.
