'It caused so much upset': Why Tracey Emin's messy bed shocked the art world in the '90s - then became an icon

In 1999, an artwork of a dishevelled divan strewn with condoms and lager cans sparked a media frenzy and turned artist Tracey Emin into a celebrity. Why? And what happened next?

Back when the world was spinning towards the 21st Century, creative culture was in its own state of revolution. In London, the city itself was shapeshifting, and the Young British Artists (aka YBAs) were an unruly constellation of rising stars (among them, Tracey Emin, Damien Hirst, Sarah Lucas, and Jake and Dinos Chapman) that embodied a collisional energy: visual art; nightlife; rock 'n' roll. Suddenly, the art scene was fuelling global media headlines, and it appeared that the most controversial, scandalous statement of all was… a woman's bed.

Warning: This article features language that some may find offensive

In 1999, Tracey Emin's My Bed (1998) was shortlisted for the prestigious Turner Prize and exhibited in Tate Britain's stately gallery: a dishevelled divan with stained sheets, strewn and surrounded with personal detritus such as contraceptives, slippers, bloodied period pants, empty vodka bottles, Polaroid selfies, an overflowing ashtray. It recreated a post-break-up depressive breakdown, when Emin had stewed in bed for days, before rising to view the chaos.

While it didn't win the prize, My Bed certainly seized the room – and sparked a furore for its messy candour; The Guardian newspaper bemoaned "Emin's insatiable appetite for exploring the sordid corners of her own life"; The LA Times reported: "Unmade Bed Exhibit Has London Tossing And Turning"; The Daily Mail lambasted the "stomach Turner". Emin would describe her work more astutely (in a 2014 BBC interview) as "half like a crime scene, half like a diary".

In 2026, I am gazing at My Bed. It is a pivotal highlight in A Second Life: Emin's new career-spanning exhibition at Tate Modern (a London landmark that hadn't existed when this sculpture was originally made). It feels like an intensely vivid, unexpectedly poignant reunion. I recall being intrigued when I first saw Emin's work in my '90s youth – but also confused, because it was so hard to focus amid the media frenzy.

Coming of age as a woman in that era was quite dizzying; pop culture was thrilling, brash, and sex-obsessed yet simultaneously prudish and misogynistic: famous (particularly working-class) women like Emin were hailed as hard-partying "ladettes" then slated for their hedonism. Men were not subjected to the same rules – and menstrual blood was apparently the most shocking medium of all. Decades later, it feels refreshing to cast off such baggage, but My Bed retains undeniable power. "I think people are so used to seeing it as an image that they forget that it's real," Emin told the BBC in 2014. "When they see it for real, it still evokes those feelings inside them, because you can see the trace of a human being in there."

"It felt really significant to bring the full range of Tracey's work back into the public eye; there are generations who know her name, but haven't had the chance to witness her art themselves," says Tate Director Maria Balshaw, who has co-curated A Second Life with Jess Baxter and Alvin Lee, working closely with Emin (now 62, and the survivor of........

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