To say of Frida Kahlo that she was a Mexican painter, is to say really very little. Because her story inspires women of all nationalities. Her life was marked by the misfortune of suffering a serious accident in her youth that kept her bedridden for long periods, going on to undergo up to 32 surgical operations. However, this did not stop her from loving, perhaps inordinately, and exposing on each blank canvas her pain, her struggle, her fears and her strengths.
That’s why in this note we score some facts about his life, to remember it and enhance his legacy. Her real name was not Frida: she decided to call herself that in 1935, but in reality she was called Madgalena Carmen Frieda Kahlo.Su date of birth is not the one that inscribes her document, which reads July 6, 1907, but she decided to frame herself in a much more allusive date and began to say that she was born in 1910 (year of the Mexican revolution).
Her health was delicate from a very young age: at the age of 6 she had poliomyelitis and, because of this disease, she had one leg left somewhat shorter than the other. Her classmates nicknamed her “Frida pata de palo” a nickname she used to sign some of her paintings. In addition, encouraged by her father, she practiced as a rehabilitation sports, uncommon for women at that time, such as boxing and football. And if you’re a pioneer, Frida studied medicine, in fact she was one of the first women to study at National High School. Although fate had other plans for her…
The day she suffered the accident that would mark her life, she and her first boyfriend were traveling in a bus, when Frida remembered that she had forgotten her umbrella, so she decided to get off to go get him. It was there that he took again the collective that would star in the terrible accident when he crashed into a tram. Frida ended up with damaged ribs, collarbones, pelvis, right leg, shoulder and spine. In addition, a piece of iron pierced her at the height of the abdomen and uterus (this is the reason why she could never be a mother). It was September 17, 1925.
Frida never fully recovered: over the years she underwent some 35 surgeries, had to wear ousted corsets, and generally go through periods of great physical pain. Something very recurrent in her paintings are the butterflies: she said she felt fragile like the wings of this animal.
In some paintings, his bed and a skeleton lying on the canopy appear. This came to be interpreted as an added element, symbolizing death. However the skeleton was real! It is one of the papier-mâché dolls that are usually burned on the feast of “burning Judas” at Easter, and he had it on his bed. She said that in her life she had two major accidents: the first was the bus accident, and the second was Diego Rivera with whom she maintained a stormy relationship throughout her life.
At the beginning of the relationship, Frida suffered greatly from Diego’s betrayals, though she soon began to do the same. What’s more, they say that Frida was looking for Diego’s mistresses and telling them that she would be able to love them much better than he would. And in many cases he had the opportunity to prove it. Throughout his life he had several lovers, among which the American photographer Nickolas Muray (thanks to him we can enjoy so many photographs of Frida), León Trotski and Chavela Vargas.Frida painted about 155 paintings (55 of which were self-portraits). She said, “I paint self-portraits because I’m alone for a long time, and I paint myself because I’m the one I know best.” Frida did not know what stereotypes were, she lived under her own rules and beyond the circumstances, she modified the painful facts of her life and put color immortalizing them.
In 1954, the year he died, he was able to fulfill a dream, despite his deteriorating health. He was able to exhibit his own exhibition in Mexico and even though his doctor forbade him to attend the event. She devised them to be present and went in her own bed. He died on July 13, 1954, at the age of 47. But it will certainly be eternal.
