Frida
Kahlo recounted the remarkable story of her life through
her paintings. She was born in 1907 on the outskirts of
Mexico City, but revised her birth date to 1910 in part to
coincide with Mexican Revolution and the birth of modern
Mexico. The birth of her nation thus became simultaneous
with her own birth and she identified Mexico's struggle
for national identity with her own internal struggles.
Between 1926 and her death at the age of 47, in 1954, she
created approximately 150 works of art, producing some of
the most original and compelling imagery of the 20th
century.
Like
her new country, Kahlo was born of two great cultures:
Judeo-Christian heritage of her European-born father and
prehispanic Indian heritage of her Mexican-born mother. To
reconcile these different cultures in her art, Kahlo
intertwined emblematic images from each with
autobiographical symbols, producing a body of work that
wove together the cultural and personal.
In
her paintings, it is common to find a self portrait or
scene from her life portrayed in the simple, unschooled
painting style of Mexican retabo
paintings (complete with dedicatory inscriptions) combined
with echoes of Christian pietas and martyrdom of saints.
Like Mexico itself, Kahlo's art is a hybrid of cultural
influences, distinguished by its idiosyncratic mixture of
traditions.
Kahlo
once remarked that she suffered two great accidents in her
life: One was a bus accident and the other was marrying
Diego Rivera. In 1925, at the age of 18, Kahlo was
severely injured in a bus accident that permanently
damaged her spinal cord and foot. She is said to have
undergone more than 32 operations and endured long periods
of convalescence.
Kahlo
began painting while recuperating from this injury. Her
mother ordered a special easel that she could use in bed
and her father, a distinguished photographer, gave her
paints and brushes. Initially, Kahlo painted subjects that
were close at hand: Her relatives, friends and herself.
In
1929, she married the famous Mexican mural painter, Diego
Rivera; She was 22 and he was 42. Her parents said it was
like an elephant marrying a dove.
Their
stormy relationship was the stuff of tabloids as well as
the subject of many haunting paintings. Traumas of her
marriage, her chronic pain, and especially her inability
to have a child promoted many of Kahlo’s finest works.
Her greatest subject was herself, which she painted
repeatedly throughout her career, always with an
unflinching intensity that remains challenging,
confrontational and unforgettable.
A
legend in her own time, Frida Kahlo’s life has recently
taken on mythic proportions. Whether because her
self-portraits resemble icons, or because the mythology
surrounding her life resembles that of a martyred saint,
Frida has become a contemporary cult figure.
The
growing audience for her work matches the popularity of
her story. In the late 1970s exhibitions were presented in
United States, Europe and Mexico, and an authorities
biography and a catalogue of complete works were published
in 1980s. Women especially have been drawn to Kahlo’s
intense portrayal of female subjects and her personal
determination to paint in spite of great physical paint.
Diego
Rivera summarized the power and significance of Kahlo’s
art in 1943: “Frida is the only example in the history
of art of an artist who tore open her chest and heart to
reveal the biological truth of her feelings … a superior
painter and the greatest proof of renaissance of the art
of Mexico.”
One
could see the evolution of Kahlo’s works from her
earliest watercolors to her last great self-portraits. In
the years following Mexican Revolution, Kahlo was one of
many artists to participate in a nationalistic celebration
of indigenous arts and customs.
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1947: Self-Portrait
with Loose Hair |
1945: Self-Portrait
with small monkey
Museo Dolores Olmedo Patino, Mexico City |
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1937: My Nurse and I
Museo Dolores Olmedo Patino, Mexico City |
1932: Henry Ford
Hospital
Museo Dolores Olmedo Patino,
Mexico City |
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