Tracey Emin's new set of 8 lithographs depicting herself are incredibly personal auto portraits and revelatory. Viewed almost as an intimate tiny sketchbook of herself, a visual diary. These editions are great examples of Emin's radical painting style which has been influenced by Expressionism. These works showcase universal feelings, raw and bittersweet emotions, which are Emin’s constant subject surrounded around the idea of love, loss, intimacy, and longing. In making herself the subject of her work, and concentrating intensely on figuration, Emin creates bridges with the rich art-historical tradition of the female figure and female nudes. She shows strong emotive force in these pictures, as seen for example in the work of male painters Munch and Schiele, which Emin admires and studied throughout her artistic oeuvre.
“ This one has two layers of black, I printed black on black. Focusing on the lower end of the image, there is a vaginal shape, referencing my (cancer) condition at the moment. At the bottom, it looks like a breast, but it also looks like a ship. I was thinking of the Egyptians, when they sailed to death. The way I picked the title for Over and Out, I was thinking of a radio receiving messages from the dead as well, and sometimes I was thinking of naming it Received. „