Educator’s Guide to Frida Kahlo’s (Self) Representations

CONTEXTUALIZING FRIDA KAHLO

Biographical Context of Frida Kahlo

Frida Kahlo was a product of her time. She was Beyond expressing her personal pain, her art
born on July 6, 1907 in Coyoacán, Mexico, also served as her introduction into the world of
though she would later change her birth date to the Mexican Communist Party, political
1910. Some say she did this to appear younger, activism, and of course, Diego Rivera. In August
others say she did it so that her birthday would 1929, Kahlo married Rivera – who was himself a
converge with the beginning of the Mexican noted Mexican painter. His role in her life and
Revolution. Regardless of her reasons, the her work is impossible to deny. Kahlo’s
triumph of the Mexican Revolution and all that relationship with him was a major impetus for a
it stood for were without doubt highly great deal of her work; the emotional influence
influential in Kahlo’s life, a life that would be he had on her remained a theme woven
anything but average and which was in truth throughout her many paintings. In November
quite exceptional. Kahlo was incredibly 1930, Rivera was commissioned to paint a
intelligent. Unlike many girls of her time, Kahlo mural in San Francisco. The couple traveled
was able to attend the highly respected Escuela there, and then spent the majority of the next
Nacional, a co-educational preparatoria in three years in San Francisco, New York, and
Mexico City, where she was preparing to study Detroit. These years spent in the U.S. were
medicine. However, hopes for any further another important influence in the
studies in medicine ended on September 17, development of Kahlo’s art. Some of her most
1925, when Kahlo was seriously injured in a famous paintings reflect her U.S. experience.
street car accident that irreversibly changed her Kahlo was critical of the U.S., and her art from
life. Over the next thirty years, Kahlo would this period shows that. This period in Kahlo’s
have numerous surgeries as a result of the life was marked by her criticism of the US, but
injuries she sustained. Her talent as a painter also by a traumatic miscarriage she experienced
was largely developed as a result of her time while abroad. This time of unhappiness was
spent in bed recovering from the initial injuries exacerbated further when, shortly after the
and surgeries. The bodily pain she endured couple’s return to Mexico, Rivera began an
became a constant theme in her art. affair with Kahlo’s sister, Cristina Kahlo. By
December 1939, Rivera and Kahlo had divorced.

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 Educator’s Guide to Frida Kahlo’s (Self) Representations

Both Rivera’s affair and the divorce hurt Frida began to receive the recognition that it
almost irreparably. She would later say, “I deserved in her home country of Mexico. In
suffered two grave accidents in my life. One in 1941 and 1942 she received two different
which a streetcar knocked me down. . .The government commissions, but only one would
other accident is Diego” (Herrera, 1983, p. 107). be completed. In 1946, Frida was one of six
Despite the pain the affair and divorce caused, artists to receive a government fellowship.
they brought about a major evolution in Kahlo’s Later that year, Kahlo received a prize of 5,000
art. By the late 1930s, Kahlo was welcomed into pesos at the annual National Exhibition of the
the world of Surrealist artists as one of their Palace of Fine Arts for her work Moses. In April
own. In the fall of 1938, Kahlo’s first solo exhibit 1953, Kahlo held her first solo exhibit in Mexico.
opened in New York, and in the late winter of Less than a year later, she would die on July 13,
1939, Kahlo opened another solo exhibit in 1954. Since her death, her work has continued
France. to grow in popularity, significantly surpassing
the attention she was given during her lifetime.
In 1940, Diego and Frida remarried, but their In 1977, the Mexican government organized a
relationship was much different in their older, retrospective exhibition of Kahlo’s work.
tempered age. Frida’s health continued to Between 1978 and 1979, Kahlo’s work was
decline, although she remained as active as she organized into an exhibition that toured various
could, both in teaching art and in politics. It was museums in the U.S. Since that time, her fame
only during this last part of her life that her art has continued to grow in the U.S.

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 Educator’s Guide to Frida Kahlo’s (Self) Representations

Frida Kahlo’s Political and Social Relation to the Art World

Kahlo was most definitely influenced by the would ever renounce Communism or its broadly
political and social context in which she lived. conceived goals. During this same period of
The Mexican Revolution, and the implications of time, political repression against leftists was
the Revolution throughout the following beginning to change. According to Hayden
decades, heavily impacted her. Julio Moreno Herrera (1983), “the period of 1929-1934 was
describes the ideological thoughts during the one of political repression. The military budget
period after the Revolution: increased, and the attitude of tolerance toward
They idealized Mexico’s indigenous and leftists changed to virulent antagonism.
folk heritage as a symbol of national Government support for labor unions ceased.
identity. They also adopted a rather Communists (Siqueiros, for example) were
romanticized version of Mexico’s past as frequently jailed, deported, or murdered, or
a heroic and revolutionary struggle that they simply disappeared.” Most likely it was
had progressively made the country a Rivera’s connections within the government
social democratic society. Yet these that spared him, at least for a period of time,
expressions of Mexican ‘identity’ the same fate of Siqueiros, who was another
coexisted with the country’s noted Mexican painter of the time.
commitment to industrial development,
commercial growth, and the U.S.-Mexican relations were also an important
reconstruction of modern Mexico. factor in this post-Revolutionary period. The
Mexicans defined national identity as 1920s through the 1930s were a relatively tense
an all-inclusive concept that elevated period for relations between the two countries.
the indigenous heritage, peasant According to Moreno (2003), “the multifaceted
tradition, entrepreneurship, industrial relationship between the two countries was
spirit, and regional diversity of the based on the establishment of cultural
country (Moreno, 2003, p. 9). boundaries or a ‘middle ground’ that ended
what up to 1940 had been a bitter and tense
It was within this formative period of post- binational relationship” (p. 8). Nelson
Revolutionary national identity that Kahlo Rockefeller’s Office of Inter-American Affairs
became involved with the Communist party. was very important in the development of the
Though she and Rivera would both leave the middle ground. As a result of improving
Communist party for a period of time, neither relations, the Mexican Arts Association was

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 Educator’s Guide to Frida Kahlo’s (Self) Representations

created, the initial impetus for which came out also did not enable them to control how Mexico
of a meeting in John D. Rockefeller, Jr.’s home. was presented in the United States. The interest
The Association was created, “to promote of families like the Rockefellers in Mexican
friendship between the people of Mexico and contemporary art “led to discourses that
the United States by encouraging cultural presented a mixed image of Mexicans and their
relations and the interchange of fine and relationship to Americans. They depicted
applied arts.” (Moreno, 2003, p. 127-128). Mexicans as backward and even ‘uncivilized’
while portraying a romanticized image of
While this middle ground may have allowed Mexico’s past and its revolutionary and
Mexicans to monitor U.S. activities in their own indigenous heritage” (Moreno, 2003, p. 52).
country, the U.S. was still influential in shaping These tendencies will be important in thinking
new societal aspirations. The middle ground about Kahlo’s reception in the U.S.

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 Educator’s Guide to Frida Kahlo’s (Self) Representations

Frida Kahlo on Body, Beauty, and the Role of Women

There has always been a great deal of pressure costumes to the influence of Rivera. Herrera
put on women to conform to certain societal (1983) writes, “Frida chose to dress as a
expectations, in both the actions one Tehuana for the same reason that she adopted
undertakes to meet society’s expectations and Mexicanism: to please Diego. Rivera liked the
how one literally and metaphorically “dresses” Tehuana costume. . . .There was of course, a
for the part. Going against these norms is at political factor as well. Wearing indigenous
once a means of social and political protest. dress was one more way of proclaiming
There is a great deal of overlap between the allegiance to la raza. Certainly Rivera did not
social and the political, but the discussion in this hesitate to make political mileage out of Frida’s
section will focus on the social criticism that clothes” (p. 111). Even when Herrera notes the
Kahlo expressed. meaning behind the costume for Kahlo, it is
both in relation to Rivera, and completely
Women’s roles in society, and the expectations apolitical. Herrera goes on to suggest, “Wearing
put upon them in terms of body and beauty, Tehuana costumes was part of Frida’s self-
were themes in the lives and works of Kahlo. creation as a legendary personality and the
While undeniably beautiful, she did not perfect companion and foil for Diego. Delicate,
conform to the contemporary fashion of her flamboyant, beautiful. . . .she invented a highly
time. She created her own persona and then individualistic personal style to dramatize the
put that on the canvas; thus it became part of personality that was already there and that she
her art. Herrera (1983) writes, “Even when she knew Diego admired” (p. 112). These
was a girl, clothes were a kind of language for descriptions only address one level of the
Kahlo, and from the moment of her marriage, meaning behind the Tehuana costume, in effect
the intricate links between dress and self- ignoring the very strong political connotations.
image, and between personal style and painting
style, form one of the subplots in her unfolding The political message in Kahlo’s use of Tehuana
drama” (p. 109). What she chose to create in dress is undeniably important, and should
that persona is of great importance. neither be relegated to a side comment, as
many authors seem to do, nor attributed solely
Kahlo’s choice of Tehuana clothing is important as a Kahlo’s wish to please Rivera. Margaret
on a number of different levels. Many historians Lindauer (1999) alludes to the deeper
and critics, like Herrera, attribute her Tehuana significance of Kahlo’s dress choices when she

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 Educator’s Guide to Frida Kahlo’s (Self) Representations

explains the history behind the women of columns began giving Mexican women advice
Tehuantepec and the political connotations of based upon North American values and
their style of clothing: practices. Often times these columns were
. . .the women of Tehuantepec maintained their written by women and celebrities from the US.
traditional matriarchal social structure in which Moreno (2003) writes of a “1943 article on how
women held primary economic and political to fight against an ‘enemy of beauty,’ body hair,
positions. In other words, according to myth, [which] gave detailed instructions on how to
they represented a past that had escaped prepare a depilatory cream and how to use it to
European rule, thereby sustaining a ‘true,’ remove unwanted hair. . . .The article described
uncorrupted Mexican society. . . .Thus the this process as a natural method. . . . However,
Tehuana dress, donned by women in urban it was neither natural nor Mexican, since there
Mexico and illustrated in post-revolutionary art, is no indication that Mexican women were
was not merely a celebration of cultural accustomed to removing their body hair prior to
heritage but an exaltation of continuous pre- the 1940s” (p. 143).
Columbian culture and defiance to cultural
assimilation (p. 126). Kahlo obviously did not conform to the North
American ideals of feminine beauty that were
The way that Kahlo dressed was, in short, a way shared through advertisements. She did not
of defying cultural assimilation and asserting believe that body hair was the ‘enemy of
the importance of her Mexicanidad. Even in a beauty.’ In fact, she was famous for her light
choice so simple as selecting her clothing, Kahlo moustache and heavy eyebrows, and she
was politically resolute and assertive. included them in every self-portrait that she
did. More than simply not eliminating these
To understand Kahlo’s resistance to cultural characteristics, she elevated their significance.
assimilation, it’s useful to understand beauty In her paintings, her eyebrows came to
ideals as they were conceptualized in Mexico represent different things. At times, they were
during her lifetime. Throughout the 1920s and wings of birds, symbolic of her desire to fly
1930s, European and North American women away from her bodily pain; at other points, they
were presented in advertising materials as the symbolized her ambivalence toward gender.
universal concept of beauty. Their white, Anglo-
Saxon skin tones and facial features were In similar sentiment, her Tehuana costume
idolized. Along with advertisements, beauty would not have been considered ‘en vogue’ in

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 Educator’s Guide to Frida Kahlo’s (Self) Representations

the 1920s and 1930s, although she would make When Kahlo read about a drunken man who
it more fashionable in the 1940s when she stabbed his girlfriend twenty times for her
appeared on the cover of Vogue magazine. supposed unfaithfulness, she responded with a
painting called A Few Small Nips. The
Kahlo’s self-depictions simultaneously asserted newspaper article claimed that, when
her Mexicanidad and her sense of being a questioned, the man replied, “But I only gave
woman. In the process, Kahlo brought her a few small nips!” Herrera (1983) examines
something previously private into the public how Kahlo deals with the topic by observing
realm, liberating women from their place in the that, “In the painting, we are presented with
home’s private spaces. Her painting, My Birth, the immediate aftermath of the murder: the
for instance, which deals with childbirth, is an killer, holding a bloodied dagger, looms over his
example of her making public what would dead victim who lies sprawled on a bed, her
typically have been an incredibly painful, naked flesh covered with bloody gashes. . . .The
private experience. McDaniel Tarver writes, impact on the viewer is immediate, almost
“My Birth takes a theme rarely treated in physical. We feel that someone in our actual
Western art, that of childbirth, the privacy of space—perhaps our self—has committed this
which is emphasized by the intimate setting (a violence” (p. 180). In making this brutal display
bedroom), and exposes it in its painful reality to of domestic violence public, Frida is protesting
the public” (p. 66). Kahlo also makes another not only the act of violence itself, but the
private act, that of breastfeeding, public in her imbalanced stereotypes surrounding me and
painting My Nurse and I. women’s sexuality and fidelity. Lindauer (1999)
writes the painting is “a visual explication of
Kahlo dealt with many experiences that women repressive social norms that delineate the
of the time (and today) silently dealt with on paradigmatic male and female, distinguished
their own. Domestic violence and abuse were not only in terms of sexual activity but also
one of these experiences. It was typical during according to active versus passive behavioral
Kahlo’s lifetime to expect that women would be roles” (p. 33).
judged harshly for infidelity, while men’s
infidelity was overlooked as normal or Kahlo also explores the question of women’s
expected. Violence against adulterous (or hidden emotions when she explores themes of
supposedly) women was relatively shame and pain in her work titled Suicide of
commonplace in Mexico and the US. Dorothy Hale. Hale was a beautiful woman who

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 Educator’s Guide to Frida Kahlo’s (Self) Representations

frequented the fashionable circles of rich did not share, but Frida’s compassion for her
society, until her husband was killed, leaving fall—literal and figurative—and her
her with little money. For a while, Hale relied on identification with her dead friend’s plight gives
the help of friends to maintain her lifestyle, but, Suicide of Dorothy Hale a peculiar intensity” (p.
unable to get another husband or a job, she 294). Kahlo offered a ‘visual’ history of the
became wretchedly unhappy, eventually plight of a friend, a plight with which many
committing suicide. Kahlo depicts the three women could identity. However, society’s
stages of Hale’s suicide as she jumped out of norms that both created and perpetuated the
her top-story window, ending with Hale lying expectations that could lead a woman like Hale
stiff on the ground, in a pool of her own blood. to suicide, were rarely, if ever, dealt with
Herrera (1983) writes, “Perhaps Dorothy Hale publicly. Kahlo made it public in her recuerdo.
was the victim of a set of values that Frida Kahlo

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 Educator’s Guide to Frida Kahlo’s (Self) Representations

The Political Message of Frida Kahlo

Kahlo was a member of the Communist party Yet even while she was drawn to the mystique
for a good part of her life, and her art often of San Francisco, Kahlo was critical overall of
provided a means for her to communicate her what she saw while in other parts of the U.S.,
political views. Interestingly, however, the especially New York and Detroit. In one letter to
political messages behind much of Kahlo’s work a friend, Kahlo writes the following of New
have been all but ignored. She has effectively York:
been de-politicized, both in her own country High society turns me off and I feel a bit
and in the United States. The intense of a rage against all these rich guys
biographical nature of Kahlo’s paintings often here, since I have seen thousands of
supersedes the political messages that she people in the most terrible misery
painted. As a result, viewers and other without anything to eat and with no
consumers of Kahlo’s work have found it easier place to sleep, that is what has most
to focus on her self-representation and impressed me here, it is terrifying to see
biographical content. the rich having parties day and night
while thousands and thousands of
In terms of her politics, Kahlo was highly critical people are dying of hunger. . . .I find
of the U.S.; her feelings in this regard were that Americans completely lack
evident in both paintings and personal sensibility and good taste. They live in
correspondence. Her dislike was not monolithic an enormous chicken coop that is dirty
and unilateral; there were areas that she and uncomfortable. The houses look like
enjoyed in her travels, such as San Francisco – a bread ovens and all the comfort that
plan with which she was enamored: they talk about is a myth (Herrera,
The city and bay are overwhelming . . . What is 1983, p. 130-131).
especially fantastic is Chinatown. The Chinese
are immensely sympathetic and never in my life Her criticism of the US was rooted largely in her
have I seen such beautiful children as the mistrust and dislike of the myths of the
Chinese ones. Yes, they are really extraordinary. superiority of U.S. culture and lifestyle that
. . .it did make sense to come here, because it were being disseminated across the globe. Her
opened my eyes and I have seen an enormous paintings during this period aptly demonstrate
number of new and beautiful things (Herrera, that. Both My Dress Hangs There (1933) and
1983, p. 118). Self-Portrait on the Border Between Mexico and

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 Educator’s Guide to Frida Kahlo’s (Self) Representations

the United States (1932) are considered to be emptiness of such a promise because
her more politically explicit paintings because the citizens of New York City,
“they critically portray the corruption, represented in the foreground by
alienation, and or dehumanization of people in newspaper photographs glued to the
the United States” (Lindauer, 1999, p. 117). surface of the painting, do not live a
liberated and prosperous life. They
In My Dress Hangs There, Kahlo has juxtaposed stand in bread lines, picket lines, chorus
her empty Tehuana dress with a collage lines, and military formation. . . .They
representing the cityscape of New York, making are faceless, anonymous, hordes of
a distinction between Mexico and the U.S. consumers standing in line for
While many writers and viewers choose to entertainment, justice, and fashionable
focus on how Kahlo’s empty dress is a symbol of goods. . .”
her loneliness and unhappiness while in the
U.S., Kahlo’s painting can be viewed equally as a But, Kahlo’s criticism was not just limited to the
strong demonstration of the critical eye with United States. Lindauer suggests a very
which she perceived the U.S. and its capitalist interesting interpretation of the symbolism of
system. Lindauer (1999) offers the following the Tehuana dress, considering it as a critique
insightful comments: of the Mexican capitalist system:
“In the upper left side of the In Kahlo’s painting it [the dress] also is
composition, the stained glass of Trinity implicated in socioeconomic corruption.
Church integrates a cross and a dollar Hanging between the trophy and the
sign, a highly cynical insinuation of a toilet of capitalist society, it does not
religious institution’s unscrupulous rise above. . .exploitation of the labor
debasement. . . .Directly above his force but rather generates an aspect of
[George Washington’s] statue, in the that oppression as the anonymous
background to the cityscape, stands the masses emanate from the skirt. . . .In
Statue of Liberty. Together they embody the same way the telephone cord acts
the founding philosophy of the United as semiotic thread implicating all
States as an immigrant nation offering aspects of capitalist industrial
individuals economic opportunity and subjugation of workers (Lindauer, 1999,
liberation from repressive governments. p. 127).
Kahlo’s composition intimates the

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 Educator’s Guide to Frida Kahlo’s (Self) Representations

The symbol of the telephone cord and the Lindauer, 1999, p. 131). This monument is
billboard are also intriguing. It’s been said that representative of the Indian and European
Kahlo found New York’s prevalence of heritages, the symbols of the past and present.
billboards intrusive; in her painting, the However, these two heritages, “never fuse. .
billboard is being destroyed in a fire. .into one whole. . .[they] will not do, politically,
precisely because it produces someone like her,
Kahlo’s Self-Portrait on the Border between like this, a mock persona. . .” (Lindauer, 1999, p.
Mexico and the United States is another 131). Her painting effectively critiques the
painting that offers a critique of the U.S. and superficiality of U.S. nationalism as represented
Mexico. Kahlo has painted the border, but with in the apparition of the U.S. flag in the industrial
stark contrast between the two countries. She smoke, a superficiality echoed in Mexico’s
has situated herself in that frontier, transparent flag, next to which smoke drifts,
demonstrating her relationship to both nations. though not as forcefully, from Kahlo’s cigarette.
Her self-portrait in that space represents what Both sides are equally devoid of life (Lindauer,
Terry Smith refers to as a “mock persona, a 1999, p. 128-131).
Mexican-American monument” (as qtd. in

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 Educator’s Guide to Frida Kahlo’s (Self) Representations

The Legacy of the Image of Frida Kahlo

Kahlo was welcomed by peoples in Mexico and she was not seen as having a political
the United States alike, but her art and what consciousness, she was not labeled as a
she stood for were not; instead, popular society subversive artist. It was not Kahlo who was
and art critics in both countries de-politicized driven out of the U.S., but Rivera.
Kahlo. When, in 1977 the Mexican government
honored her with a retrospective exhibit of her The de-politicization of Kahlo has made gthe
work in the Palace of Fine Arts, it was what world’s current Fridamania possible. In 1990 at
Herrera (1983) called “a strange sort of Sotheby’s auction house, Kahlo’s painting,
homage, for it seemed to celebrate the exotic Diego and I, went for 1.43 million dollars. Jack
personality and story of the artist rather more Rummel (2000) writes, the sale “confirmed an
than it honored her art.” Most critics and art irony. It had been Kahlo’s work, more than her
consumers ignored the elements of social and husband’s or many of the other recognized
political protest in her paintings, instead male artists of her lifetime, that has not only
focusing on the autobiographical and the exotic. endured, but has triumphed” (p. 15). Despite
The default view held that she and her art were the increasing danger in espousing anti-
exotic, but not political. American sentiment, the fame of the woman
who painted Marxism Will Heal You, has
Kahlo was not alone in experiencing this. Art reached an all-time high within the U.S.
collectors like Rockefeller even tried to de-
politicize Diego Rivera, at least initially. When In an affirmation of Kahlo’s popularity,
criticized for commissioning Rivera, a known Madonna bought two Kahlo paintings in 1990,
Communist, to offer a show, Rockefeller made and the 2002 movie, Frida, not only became a
sure that the following was included in the blockbuster, but earned Selma Hayek an Oscar
exhibit’s catalogue, “Diego’s very spinal column nomination. Kahlo’s likeness and her paintings
is painting, not politics. . .” (Herrera, 1983, p. have appeared on everything from socks to
127-128). However; Rivera’s work was largely billboards, and her well-known coiffure with a
granted its due as a political act. Kahlo’s work, flower crown has become appropriated by
although equally critical and politically incisive, women and men alike. So, Rummel is right,
was never politicized and never viewed in a Kahlo did endure, but we might ask: does the
subversive light, particularly in the U.S. Since image that endures reflect her reality?

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