Tracey Emin’s bed is to be sold at auction this summer with a guide price of £800,000 to £1.2 million, although the man who sold it to Charles Saatchi has said it’s priceless. Emin was part of the British art movement in the ‘90s that gave Richard Dorment trouble at dinner parties; this scene is an occupational hazard of being an art critic, he said.
‘The beautiful person I’m sitting next to has bluntly informed me that modern art is rubbish. We’re only on the soup, and a long evening stretches ahead. Whether or not we round this dangerous corner depends on my neighbour’s tone of voice, which can range from raw aggression to lively interest. If it is confrontation she is after, the rule is: change the subject as fast as possible. If she persists, the rule remains: don’t go there. But if, by now, she’s on to Tracey’s knickers, then I’ve got a full-blown case of modern-art rage on my hands.
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