Art in Context | Memory and Paint: A Therapeutic Encounter Between Artist and Observer
Michael Kaplan, a child and adolescent psychiatrist, will explore how Tracey Emin’s paintings invite the viewer into her conscious and unconscious thoughts, much like the dialogue between therapist and patient.
Tracey Emin has stated that in painting, “everything has come through me,” that her feelings “entered my mind, travelled through my heart, my blood, arriving at the end of my hand.” Her paintings hold her feelings through gesture, brushstroke, color, line, and erasure. The paintings in this exhibition share difficult narratives and directly address challenging, sensitive subjects. Many of Emin’s narratives, based in experiences of trauma, invite the viewer into her conscious and unconscious thoughts, much like the dialogue between therapist and patient. In this talk, Michael Kaplan will explore how Emin communicates to the observer the role of memory, isolation, grief, rage, loss, and hope as she lays bare her vulnerability and reclaims her narrative.
For more information, please visit: https://britishart.yale.edu/exhibitions-programs/art-context-memory-and-paint