Frida Kallo is one the few female painters that has achieved international fame. She is also the only Mexican artist to have been internationally recognized. There are many words to describe Frida Kahlo, including the Mexican, revolutionary, non-conformist and surrealist. She is unrivalled in freedom, individuality, and her work. Indeed, her life was anything but a slow and peaceful one. This has been shown many times in biographies as well as films. But are you familiar with her story? Artsper shares 10 anecdotes about the life of this iconoclastic painter!
1. Frida is not Mexican.
Magdalena Frida Carmen Kahlo Calderon (her real name) was born July 6, 1907. She used falsifying her birth date to set it back to the year of the Mexican Revolution, July 7, 1910.
She was born Mexico City. But she is not Mexican! Matilde Calderon y Gonzalez is her mother. She comes from a Spanish-general family. Her veins are also rich in Indian blood. Her father, Carl Wilhelm Kahlo Kauffmann, was born in Germany. Contrary to the claims of Frida, he wasn’t Jewish. Her family was Lutheran, and she belonged to Baden’s middle classes. Guillermo Kahlo was her name when she arrived in Mexico, 1891. She settled down as a photographer.
2. She didn’t have happy childhood.
Frida Kahlo was a daughter of a mother who had lost her son. Depressed, her mother sent her to a nanny. She was extremely cold.
The home atmosphere is very melancholy. Aside from the tensions in her home between her parents, and her two half-sisters who were sent to the convent with her parents, her father’s business did not prosper during the Mexican revolution.
Frida’s health, in particular, is fragile. She was born with spina bifurca, which deforms her spine. At the age of six, she develops polio. This serious infectious disease causes her chronic pain. A malformation has also been caused by her right leg not growing properly. Her disease also makes her isolated from other children. Her nickname is “Fria La Coja”, which means “Frida The Lame”. She cannot attend school. The first year of her schooling was turbulent. She was forced to attend a German high school by her father and was soon expelled from the school for disobedience. This is a testimony to her strong and reckless nature from an early age. Then, she was accepted into a vocational school that trained women teachers. She stayed there for a few months. When her parents discovered she had been sexually abused, the school removed her.
3. She was close to becoming a Doctor.
Frida Kallo did not always dream of becoming a painter. She was fortunate that her father, a fine artist, passed his passion for art to her at an early age. Her father’s friend, an engraver and engraver, gave her some drawing lessons. Her father is a professional photographer and she assists him by retouching, developing and coloring photographs. However, art is more of a hobby to her.
She was just 16 when she was the youngest of 35 girls accepted into the Escuela Nacional Preparatoria. This school had a total of 2,000 students. It was the most prestigious school in Mexico at that time. She discovered a passion for natural sciences there and decided to become a doctor.
4. Bus-crash is the foundation of her career.
On her way to school on 17 September 1925, her bus struck a tramway. The accident sealed her fate. She survived the accident, but was still severely injured. The metal bar that was embedded in her pelvic cavity caused systemic miscarriages. She also has 11 broken bones in her right leg. Her right foot is completely dislocated while her shoulder has been dislocated. Her spine is broken and her femoral neck is also broken. In pain and suffering for many months, she remained in bed. She has had 32 operations, and will continue to wear 28 corsets, up until the end.
Back at home, she’s forced to stay in bed. She then wrote, “I am not dead and have a reason for living.” The reason is painting. Her family encouraged her painting because of her compromised medical studies. They made a special easel for her and a canopy bed with mirrors as a ceiling. Her healing was facilitated by art, which became her outlet from all her problems. She begins a series important self-portraits. They will remain her favorite subject.
5. A member of the Communist Party, she’s a Pioneer Figure in Feminism.
Tina Modotti, a photographer in Italy, instigated her to join the Mexican Communist Party (MCP) in 1928. At the time, she was just 21 years old.
However, as a teenager she was committed to the defense and promotion of Mexican culture and social justice. The Escuela Nacional Preparatoria actually praised the indigenismo. This nationalist ideology highlighted Mexico’s indigenous heritage in order to affirm the country’s superiority. It also rejected the Western colonialist mentality. Frida and nine other women comrades created a group called “Cachuchas”, literally “baseball caps”; it was formed by Frida, Kahlo, and nine others. They discussed Russian literature, politics and culture and rejected the patriarchal and macho Mexican society. Many of these men became prominent figures in Mexico’s intellectual elite.
So, the Communist Party was committed, apart from class struggle, to the emancipation, and equality of women. She was thus a major feminist artist. Modern, modern, and unsubmissive, she took on her bisexuality when few women would dare to.
6. Diego Rivera is one of the greatest mythical couples of the History of Art.
1928 saw her decisive encounter with Diego Rivera, a muralist. He is also 20 years old and a member of Communist Party. His art was put to use for the benefit of the people through large frescoes created by the government. He was already well-recognized. They share a common passion for politics and painting. Their admiration is what makes them a unique couple.
They were married in 1929. Their relationship was passionate but destructive. She confessed that she was the victim of two severe accidents in her own life. The first was caused by a Bus, and the other was Diego. Diego was the worst. Diego had cheated on her numerous times… and she did it again. She considered her husband’s extramarital relationships with her sister a true betrayal in 1935. Although they were separated for several months, their love has not faltered. Frida also has an affair in which she falls for Leon Trotsky, the communist revolutionary. The Russian politician, who had been granted asylum in Mexico in 1937, was actually accommodated at their home. They divorced in 1938 and later remarried in 40. The couple remained together until their death.
It is indicative of their relationship that they lived in the same house during their first marriage. The house is composed of two buildings: one for Frida and one for Diego. They are connected by a bridge. It is a metaphor to their couple: independent but inextricably linked.
7. Frida Kallo isn’t a Surrealist Artist.
Andre Breton, a surrealist and traveler to Mexico City in 1938 discovered Frida Kallo’s work while on a trip. Fascinated, he invited Frida Kahlo to Paris in 1939 for a major exhibit in Mexico.
But she was not happy with the city or the exhibition. She called it a “smokehouse” and said that the event was not suitable for her. It was far too cartoonish and picturesque of her nation. Not all of her paintings were kept and her painting was misinterpreted. She says, “It’s unfair. I have never painted dreams. My reality was the image I created. In fact, her paintings are autobiographical. This group of pretentious and scornful intellectuals is what she believes she has misunderstood. She wrote to Nickolas to express her opinion on Surrealists: “I’d prefer to sit on the Toluca market floor selling tortillas than to have anything to do the lousy Parisian artist.”
Her first international recognition came with her trip to France. Picasso made Picasso ivory earrings for her in Parisian art, Schiaparelli gave her Madame Rivera clothes, and the Louvre bought her an image of herself.
8. Her works are a metaphorical account of her life.
Her work is a part of her everyday life. Frida Kallo has been a devoted artist since the day she was injured in an accident. She doesn’t show any modesty or complacency in depicting her physical and moral suffering. The Broken Column (1944), is one of her most famous paintings. It shows her body, which has been subject to a series if surgical procedures.
She has nearly 70 self portraits. She shows herself in retrospect as she was a child when she wrote My Nurse and I (1937). Sometimes, she also portrays her parents. She also depicts her and discusses their miscarriages as in Henry Ford Hospital (1932).
It is her Mexicanness that she claims in these representations of herself, but it is much more. It is a sign of her deep appreciation for the cultural heritage of her country. She frequently wears the China Poblano, which is a traditional, colorful, and florally embroided dress. Braids or buns with flowers are also a common style. A lot of her paintings are influenced by Mexican culture, particularly its fauna, and flora. In her paintings, parrots are incorporated with cacti and other elements of local folklore, such as flags and exquisite corpses .
In several paintings, she also clearly shows her political commitment. The self-portrait she took with Stalin (1954) and Marxism will bring Health to the sick (1954) are both examples of this. Many evocations of death can be seen in her last moments, as she depicts herself as a dead deer, pierced by arrows or placed beside corpses.
9. She suffered pain all her life. Her last years were difficult.
Frida Kallo’s optimism and unfailing joy are tempered by constant pain that runs from her back to the tip of her toes. From 1950 onwards, her health was particularly bad. She had seven operations on her spine. Although her first monographic exhibit was held in 1953 she was forbidden by her doctor to get out of bed. Her doctor insisted that she move her bed to the gallery. There, she made a triumphant entry like a queen from her throne.
Soon afterward, she was diagnosed with gangrene due to one of her operations. She had to have the right leg amputated. After this, she fell into deep depression. In 1954, she succumbed to pneumonia and died just days after her 47th Birthday. Just before her death, she wrote that she hoped for a joyous exit and would never return. Suicide is an option, but it’s not impossible to imagine someone waiting to die.
She has been cremated according to her wishes. She did not want to be buried on her back, as she suffered too much from it.
10. Frida Kallo was honored with national recognition in her lifetime.
Living for so many years in the shadows of her husband, her 1942 election to the Seminario de Cultura Mexicana is proof that she has been recognized by public institutions. The Seminario de Cultura Mexicana is an association of famous cultural personalities, which was created by the government in order to promote Mexican culture through publications, conferences and exhibitions.
The School of Fine Arts then entrusted her to teach painting in one of their classes in 1943. Mexican Federal Bank decided to use her portrait on one side and Diego Rivera on the other for the 2010 creation of a 500 peso new banknote. This is an iconic image in the history art and became policy in 1990s for Chicano Movement, which fought for civil rights of Mexican-Americans.
Here are some things to remember
Frida is more than an artist. Her symbolism for Mexico is particularly important. She is a symbol for feminist and LGBT movements due to her strong character and independence. Her image has inspired many artists and been re-exploited commercially. She is a street artist and icon, having been printed on T-shirts, posters, and mugs. It is clear that the anti-capitalist she was must have been stricken by the misappropriation and misuse of her work. However, she would be comforted to see that her political and artistic influence is not diminishing.
