Install Gate Of Horn Exhibition, Carl Freeman Gallery 2025
Emma Franks (b. 1972), visual artist, was raised in Essex and now lives and works in London. Emma studied Fine Art at Brighton University (1994), Art Psychotherapy at Hertfordshire University (1999) and Studio Painting at Turps Banana Art School (2023). Franks previously worked within state education and the National Health Service, in addition to being a practising artist.
About The Work
Franks’s work is autobiographical and expresses lived experience as a Jewish woman diagnosed with a rare autoimmune illness and neurological conditions, Ankylosing Spondylitis, Autism, ADHD and Misophonia. Also explored are experiences as a mother and an older woman.
These themes are channeled into the art works and the broad breadth of mediums used reflects this. Artist books, performance, costume, dry points and paintings, these are the many disciplines Franks uses to tackle the daily overwhelming barrage of incoming stimuli which can range from feeling hugely distressing to highly euphoric. As these conditions are sensory and bodily focused, art offers a release and an opportunity to expel. Franks experiences the world in technicolour and often in extremes, the art work reflects this. For example, bodies are often exaggerated, emotions are larger than life, colours are vibrant and images are confronting.
Without knowing that Franks had the debilitating health condition Ankylosing Spondilyitis (it took the medical doctors 8 years to diagnose) nor that Misaphonia was even a condition or she was Audhd, Franks grew up with the belief she was a broken human being. Never feeling she fitted in socially, constantly overwhelmed, in physical pain and challenged by everything and everyone. Being a Jewish woman also fits neatly into the category of experiencing life as an outsider and adds another dimension to being a marginalised member of society.
As a result Franks makes work that is vulnerable, sensitive, bodily, bold, funny and emotional and she’s found the following figures from mythology and ancient movements useful protagonists in her personal story. Lilith, Chalcolithic figurines and monsters are recurrent archetypes that she’s drawn to and feature heavily depending on what is most present in her life, interchangeably using them as influences and inspirations.
Lilith
‘I often feel disempowered by my various conditions and much of my work is an attempt to empower myself and feel powerful. Manifestation and Fake it until you make it!’
Lilith is a good protagonist for Franks to identify with because she is an established feminist icon, historically used by Jewish women during second wave feminism. Lilith embodies female rage, power and rebellion. The particular image of Lilith that Franks uses is taken from an ancient incantation bowl from 500AD exhibited in the Feminist Power Exhibition at The British Museum in 2022. Lilith became the founding mother of the first fictional feminist religion that was created for the performance ‘The 13th Tribe’. Lilith work was exhibited in ‘The Temple of Lilith’ Gallery as part of the Gate of Horns Exhibition curated by Hettie Judah in 2025.
Chalcolithic Figurines
Ever since Franks visited Nicosia Museum in Cyprus as part of an art residency with the Cyprus School Of Art she has been using ancient figurines from the Chalcolithic period. Drawn to these depictions of the female form as they are a realistic recreation of the body. Curvaceous, fully breasted and not yet objectifying and changing the body to fit an idealised male standard.
Monsters
Monsters are useful for Franks to use as another means of self-expression. The condition Misaphonia, a neurological and sensory dysregulation condition that generates a Fight and Flight response to certain sounds is a condition Franks has had since the age of 12 but didn’t know until her late 40’s that this condition existed. Instead Franks believed she was the only person in the world who experienced certain noises as attacks on the body. Franks kept these distressing experiences a secret and as a result carries a lot of shame and embarrassment. Finding out that Misaphonia is a recognised condition was hugely validating, however Franks continues to live with the daily barrage of painful noises and there is no cure. Relationships are affected and when a Misaphonia ‘attack’ occurs Franks’s body is stuck in Fight mode and rage is the predominant emotion. After the Misaphonia attack has receded and cognitive function returns Franks begins to feel the shame and embarrassment of this attack and Franks then takes on the identity of a monster. Another dimension of using monsters in the work is the experience of being a Jewish woman. Jews are often depicted as monsters within antisemitic literature and imagery and also Jewish women are caricatured as loud, dominating, brash and overbearing and somewhat monstrous.
Truth, honesty and breaking taboos around womanhood, neurological conditions and illness are very important in Franks’s work. Having had to hide her challenges and submit to the expectations on women to fit a certain submissive role in society, it is vital that the work does not hide the lived reality of living with so many challenging conditions in an ableist society and Franks’s work fulfils this role.
Exhibitions, Inhabiting Bodies AGBI, LondonThe Books Of Lilith, APT Gallery, Deptford, London, Gates Of Horns: Myths of Resistance, Symbols of Defiance’, Carl Freedman Gallery, Margate 2025, Bow Arts Open Call, Nunnery Gallery 2024. Bow, Blink, Safe House Peckham 2024, Ripe Banana Leavers Show 2023, Naissance Re-Naissance Unit Gallery London 2023, and Recreational Grounds VII (2023); Love, Celebration and the Road Ahead, TJ Boulting (2022); Mood Times Ten, Fitzrovia Gallery 2022; Arundel Contemporary 2018 and The Stratford Gallery 2018.
Publications
https://journals.sagepub.com/eprint/EBYJHC4U5ARIWFYTJ6PR/full
Podcasts
videos
https://click.email.vimeo.com/u/?qs=0d6a16df2c5087fa0c2a60fbf13077acbc99c10acb6523eb8013b8607f6429cf06f33aeb07c918fb5f165074b6141c630710de1554ceb00ece93bf34d091aae6