frida kahlo biography.docx

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Frida Kahlo Biography

Childhood and family

Self Portrait With Necklace

Magdalena Carmen Frida Kahlo y Calderon, as her name appears on her birth certificatewas born on July 6, 1907 in the house of her parents, known as La Casa Azul (The BlueHouse), in Coyoacan. At the time, this was a small town on the outskirts of Mexico City.

Her father, Guillermo Kahlo (1872-1941), was born Carl Wilhelm Kahlo in Pforzheim,Germany. He was the son of the painter and goldsmith Jakob Heinrich Kahlo and HenriettE. Kaufmann.

Kahlo claimed her father was of Jewish and Hungarian ancestry, but a 2005 book on

Guillermo Kahlo, Fridas Vater (Schirmer/Mosel, 2005), states that he was descended froma long line of German Lutherans.

Wilhelm Kahlo sailed to Mexico in 1891 at the age of nineteen and, upon his arrival,changed his German forename, Wilhelm, to its Spanish equivalent, 'Guillermo'. During thelate 1930s, in the face of rising Nazism in Germany, Frida acknowledged and asserted herGerman heritage by spelling her name, Frieda (an allusion to "Frieden", which means"peace" in German).

Frida's mother, Matilde Calderon y Gonzalez, was a devout Catholic of primarilyindigenous, as well as Spanish descent. Frida's parents were married shortly after the death

of Guillermo's first wife during the birth of her second child. Although their marriage wasquite unhappy, Guillermo and Matilde had four daughters, with Frida being the third. Shehad two older half sisters. Frida once remarked that she grew up in a world surrounded byfemales. Throughout most of her life, however, Frida remained close to her father.

The Mexican Revolution began in 1910 when Kahlo was three years old. Later, however,Kahlo claimed that she was born in 1910 so people would directly associate her with therevolution. In her writings, she recalled that her mother would usher her and her sisters
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inside the house as gunfire echoed in the streets of her hometown, which was extremely poor at the time. Occasionally, men would leap over the walls into their backyard andsometimes her mother would prepare a meal for the hungry revolutionaries.

Kahlo contracted polio at age six, which left her right leg thinner than the left, which Kahlo

disguised by wearing long skirts. It has been conjectured that she also suffered from spina bifida, a congenital disease that could have affected both spinal and leg development. As agirl, she participated in boxing and other sports. In 1922, Kahlo was enrolled in thePreparatoria, one of Mexico's premier schools, where she was one of only thirty-five girls.Kahlo joined a gang at the school and fell in love with the leader, Alejandro Gomez Arias.During this period, Kahlo also witnessed violent armed struggles in the streets of MexicoCity as the Mexican Revolution continued.

Career as painter

Self Portrait 1932

After the accident, Frida Kahlo turned her attention away from the study of medicine to begin a full-time painting career. The accident left her in a great deal of pain while sherecovered in a full body cast; she painted to occupy her time during her temporary state ofimmobilization. Her self-portraits became a dominant part of her life when she wasimmobile for three months after her accident. Frida Kahlo once said, "I paint myself

because I am often alone and I am the subject I know best". Her mother had a special easelmade for her so she could paint in bed, and her father lent her his box of oil paints andsome brushes.

Drawing on personal experiences, including her marriage, her miscarriages, and hernumerous operations, Kahlo's works often are characterized by their stark portrayals of

pain. Of her 143 paintings, 55 are self-portraits which often incorporate symbolic portrayalsof physical and psychological wounds. She insisted, "I never painted dreams. I painted myown reality".

Kahlo was deeply influenced by indigenous Mexican culture, which is apparent in her useof bright colors and dramatic symbolism. She frequently included the symbolic monkey. InMexican mythology, monkeys are symbols of lust, yet Kahlo portrayed them as tender and

protective symbols. Christian and Jewish themes are often depicted in her work. Shecombined elements of the classic religious Mexican tradition with surrealist renderings.
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At the invitation of Andre Breton, she went to France in 1939 and was featured at anexhibition of her paintings in Paris. The Louvre bought one of her paintings, The Frame,which was displayed at the exhibit. This was the first work by a 20th century Mexican artistever purchased by the internationally renowned museum.

Stormy marriage

Portrait Of Diego Rivera

As a young artist, Kahlo approached the famous Mexican painter, Diego Rivera, whosework she admired, asking him for advice about pursuing art as a career. He immediatelyrecognized her talent and her unique expression as truly special and uniquely Mexican. Heencouraged her development as an artist and soon began an intimate relationship withFrida. They were married in 1929, despite the disapproval of Frida's mother. They oftenwere referred to as The Elephant and the Dove, a nickname that originated when Kahlo'sfather used it to express their extreme difference in size.[citation needed]

Their marriage often was tumultuous. Notoriously, both Kahlo and Rivera had fierytemperaments and both had numerous extramarital affairs. The openly bisexual Kahlo hadaffairs with both men (including Leon Trotsky) and women; Rivera knew of and toleratedher relationships with women, but her relationships with men made him jealous. For her

part, Kahlo became outraged when she learned that Rivera had an affair with her youngersister, Cristina. The couple eventually divorced, but remarried in 1940. Their secondmarriage was as turbulent as the first. Their living quarters often were separate, althoughsometimes adjacent.

Later years Active communist sympathizers, Kahlo and Rivera befriended Leon Trotsky as he sought

political sanctuary from Joseph Stalin's regime in the Soviet Union. Initially, Trotsky livedwith Rivera and then at Kahlo's home, where they reportedly had an affair. Trotsky and hiswife then moved to another house in Coyoacan where, later, he was assassinated.
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Death

Viva la Vida, 1954

A few days before Frida Kahlo died on July 13, 1954, she wrote in her diary: "I hope theexit is joyful - and I hope never to return - Frida". The official cause of death was given as

pulmonary embolism, although some suspected that she died from overdose that may ormay not have been accidental. An autopsy was never performed. She had been very illthroughout the previous year and her right leg had been amputated at the knee, owing togangrene. She also had a bout of bronchopneumonia near that time, which had left her quitefrail.

Later, in his autobiography, Diego Rivera wrote that the day Kahlo died was the most tragicday of his life, adding that, too late, he had realized that the most wonderful part of his lifehad been his love for her.

A pre-Columbian urn holding her ashes is on display in her former home, La Casa Azul(The Blue House), in Coyoacan. Today it is a museum housing a number of her works ofart and numerous relics from her personal life.
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