My Heart Is With You Always

Writing has recently come to enjoy a privileged position within scholarly and critical consideration of Tracey Emin’s works. Whilst much has been said about her drawings and paintings, not to mention her installation pieces, Emin’s writings remain an uncharted territory that in the past few years has captivated the public. The immediacy and raw honesty of Emin’s writings are arguably even more striking than her visual depictions. Written text already features in many of her visual depictions, for instance in her Polaroid series, but it is only in her Neon series and in works like My Heart Is With You Always where Emin’s words occupy the entirety of the work.

My Heart Is With You Always was made in 2015 as both a pink and blue embroidery on a linen napkin, and as a neon sign. The image presents a blue-coloured heart with a red-coloured writing inside of it that reads “my heart is with you always”. This sentence, however short, carries within it all the emotional poignancy of Emin’s works, which tackle universal thematics of love, loss and pain, best captured through her sharp and now-iconic language.