July 3, 1963

Tracey Emin, (July 3, 1963) was just in the news and not because of her birthday. A famous work of hers, a museum installation consisting of her bed, her very used bed, and titled "My Bed" (1998) just sold (July 1, 2014) for £2.5million.

She sounds like a tough, nice lady and it wasn't too surprising to find out that when her cat, named Docket, went missing, she put flyers all around to find her lost cat. This was in March of 2002.  From a cultural perspective this presented an interesting situation.

When her cat went missing in 2002 Tracey Emin displayed in her neighbourhood several photocopies of a handwritten Missing Cat poster. Many of these posters were taken down by members of the public and were subsequently valued at around £500 each. We can guess that they appeal as tantalizing bits of ephemera from the life of a celebrated artist; an appeal amplified by the resemblance they bear to Emin’s artworks in form and content, and moreover by the established ambiguity between Emin’s life and her work.

Docket was found after almost a week. The cat had been  trapped in an abandoned house. Emin heard her crying from the sidewalk and now Docket is safe and spoiled again.

Or so I wrote some years ago. Now (February 23, 2020) we read:

Tracey Emin’s cat, Docket, was her friend, companion and muse for almost 20 years. The Mail on Sunday has reported his death at 19-years-of-age. She said that she never knew she could love an animal so much and that it was a joining of souls. You may know Tracey Emin. She is a well-known British artist who became famous with her conceptual art exhibit which was her unmade bed. It was called My Bed and Everyone I Have Ever Slept with 1963-1995.