Frida Kahlo: Artist Painting Reality
“I don’t paint dreams or nightmares, I paint my own reality.”— Frida Kahlo
Who is Frida Kahlo?
Frida Kahlo, in full Magdalena Carmen Frieda Kahlo y Calderón, was born in 1907, Mexico and died in 1954, Mexico.
In the 1930s, Kahlo was seriously involved in a bus accident, leaving with more than 30 medical operations and during the recovery process, Kahlo self learned to paint.
The painter is best known for her vibrantly coloured self-portraits showing Mexican indigenous culture and female experience which apply themes like identity, human body, and death.
Kahlo painted her own suffering and struggles, depicting her physical and emotional pain. Therefore, the common theme of Kahlo’s artworks is life experience.
Let’s explore Kahlo’s artworks!
Although the paintings are pretty abstract, Kahlo’s soft drawing of her face and body reveal her interest in realism. And despite the fact that Kahlo denied the relation, she is usually analyzed as a Surrealist (the artists who practice the production of fantastic imagery of effects by means of unnatural combinations in art).
In her lifetime, Kahlo did not sell many of her paintings, but she occasionally accepted commissions. Moreover, she had a total of one solo exhibition in Mexico in 1953, right before she died at the age of 47. However, today, Frida Kahlo is considered one of the highest price selling female artists.
This very first self-portrait in 1926 is called Self Portrait in a Velvet Dress, where she painted in the style of the 19th century Mexican painters who were influenced by the European Renaissance time. The portrait implied her emotional tension for her first lover Alejandro Gómez Arias.
Later, Kahlo explored various painting styles for her self-portraits. Some of her most notable works include “Frieda and Diego Rivera” which depicts Kahlo with her husband Rivera, “The two Fridas” which shows 2 versions of Frida together, and “The broken column” which reveals her physical challenges of surgeries and corsets wearing.
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