Editing Tracey Emin (section)

===Venice Biennale (2007)===
In August 2006, the [[British Council]] announced that they had chosen Emin to produce a show of new and past works for the British Pavilion at the 52nd [[Venice Biennale]] in 2007. Emin was the second woman to produce a solo show for the UK at the Biennale, following [[Rachel Whiteread]] in 1997. Andrea Rose, the commissioner for the British Pavilion, stated that the exhibition would allow Emin's work to be viewed "in an international context and at a distance from the [[Young British Artists|YBA]] generation with which she came to prominence.".<ref>"[http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/5285970.stm Emin art show planned for Venice] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071005153042/http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/5285970.stm |date=5 October 2007 }}", BBC, 25 August 2006.</ref><ref>{{Cite book|title=Seven Days in the Art World|author=Sarah Thornton|isbn=9780393337129|location=New York|oclc=489232834|author-link=Sarah Thornton|date=2 November 2009}}</ref>

Emin picked the title ''Borrowed Light''<ref>{{cite web|url= https://www.artimage.org.uk/20933/tracey-emin/borrowed-light--2007--venice-biennale |title= Borrowed Light |last= Emin |first= Tracey |date= 2007 |website= Venice Biennale |publisher= Artimage }}</ref> for the exhibition. She produced new work especially for the British Pavilion, using a wide variety of media – from needlework, photography and video to drawing, painting, sculpture and neon. A promotional British Council flyer included an image of a previously unseen monoprint for the exhibition called ''Fat Minge'' (1994) that was included in the show, while the ''Telegraph'' newspaper<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/3675158/52-International-Biennale-Venice.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101024200220/http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/3675158/52-International-Biennale-Venice.html |archive-date=2010-10-24 |url-access=subscription |url-status=live|work=The Daily Telegraph|location=London, UK|title=52 International Biennale, Venice|access-date=25 May 2010|date=8 December 2008}}</ref> featured a photo of a new purple neon ''Legs I'' (2007) that was on display (directly inspired by Emin's 2004 purple watercolour ''Purple Virgin'' series). Emin summed up her Biennale exhibition work as "Pretty and hard-core".<ref>Taken from the British Council flyer to promote the 52nd International Art Exhibition in Venice Biennale</ref>

Emin was interviewed about the Venice Biennale by the BBC's [[Kirsty Wark]] in November 2006. Emin showed Wark some work-in-progress, which included large-scale canvases with paintings of Emin's legs and vagina. Starting with the ''Purple Virgin'' (2004) acrylic watercolour series with their strong purple brush strokes depicting Emin's naked open legs, leading to Emin's paintings in 2005-6 such as ''Asleep Alone With Legs Open'' (2005), the ''Reincarnation'' (2005) series and ''Masturbating'' (2006) amongst others, these works were a significant new development in her artistic output.

Andrea Rose, the British Pavilion commissioner, added to this commenting on the art Emin has produced, "It's remarkably ladylike. There is no ladette work – no toilet with a poo in it – and actually it is very mature I think, quite lovely. She is much more interested in formal values than people might expect, and it shows in this exhibition. It's been revelatory working with her. Tracey's reputation for doing shows and hanging them is not good, but she's been a dream to work with. What it shows is that she's moved a long way away from the YBAs. She's quite a lady actually!"<ref>Barber, Lynn, [http://arts.guardian.co.uk/art/visualart/story/0,,2093995,00.html "From party girl to Biennale queen"]  {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080705181424/http://arts.guardian.co.uk/art/visualart/story/0%2C%2C2093995%2C00.html |date=5 July 2008 }}, ''The Guardian'', 3 June 2007.</ref>