KULTURA / CULTURE
walls, as this is an immersive experience that penetrates into her very identity. The curators are showcasing more than 30 orig- inal works, including her iconic self-por- traits, in which she directly confronts her own mortality and pain. However, mak- ing this exhibition a blockbuster are the more than 200 personal items taken from Mexico’s archives. Visitors can approach within half a metre of her famous Tehuana dresses, the heavy jewellery that she wore like armour, her intimate diaries and even the hand-painted medical plaster corsets and high-heeled orthopaedic boots that hid her shorter leg. In the exhibition’s accompanying bro- chure and catalogue, the British curators present a bold but accurate thesis: Frida Kahlo was an absolute pioneer of what we today call “brand building”. Decades be- fore the era of social media and modern PR, she constructed and controlled her own image consciously, and with surgical precision. Her self-portraits weren’t on- ly a reflection of her inner struggle, but a powerful weapon with which she created a myth about herself, communicated her radical political views and turned her own vulnerability into indestructible strength. In order to truly experience Frida’s art, you must first familiarise yourself with her agony. Magdalena Carmen Frida Kahlo y Calderón was born in Coyoacán, a suburb of Mexico City, in 1907. She contracted polio at the age of six, which left her right leg thinner and shorter. However, the re- al horrific catastrophe of her life came at the age of 18, when she was riding a bus that collided with a tram. An iron hand- rail pierced her abdomen and pelvis, while her spine was fractured in three places
and her collarbone and ribs were crushed. Doctors were certain she wouldn’t sur- vive. Bedridden in a full body plaster cast for several months, she asked her moth- er to bring her paints to cope with the boredom. A mirror was mounted above her headboard, and so it was that – out of sheer necessity and desperation – she be- gan painting the only thing she could see: her face. As she once said: “I paint myself because I’m so often alone and because I’m the subject I know best”. She used the canvas to convey her terrible physical tor- ment, which included over 30 difficult sur- geries, and her unfulfilled desire for moth- erhood. Her life was also marked by her stormy and destructive relationship with Diego Rivera. Their relationship, described in Mexican circles as “the elephant and the dove”, was an entanglement of mutual in- fidelity, divorce and remarriage, and raw, inexplicable passion. Frida didn’t paint landscapes, still life scenes or dreams; she painted her own blood-soaked reality. That’s why museums worldwide today snatch up every one of her canvases, while oceans are crossed to view her works. Despite some works having made it as far as London, Paris or New York, the real Frida has remained for- ever in her homeland. Once exhibitions conclude, her most important legacy re- turns to Mexico City – to the huge col- lection of the Dolores Olmedo Museum, but primarily to La Casa Azul (The Blue House). This house, named after its dis- tinctive cobalt-blue walls, was where Fri- da was born and raised, lived and loved, and ultimately died in 1954. It is today a museum where her wheelchair still stands in front of the easel.
THE STORY OF FRIDA KAHLO Dissecting a myth at the heart of London Visit the ultimate monument to a fragile woman who – through the power of will and talent – managed to overcome mortality and become an icon for all time I f you want to delve into the uni- verse of the wonderful Frida Kahlo this November, and to gain an un- derstanding of the anatomy of her fame, let your travels lead you to the UK. The monumental Tate Modern museum, housed in a former power sta- tion on the south bank of the Thames that has since been transformed into one of the world’s most important and popular contemporary art museums, is currently presenting the most complex story of this artist... beyond Mexico, of course. Under the title Frida: The Making of an Icon, this spectacular exhibition runs un- til 3 rd January, 2027. What exactly awaits you there? Certainly not just a prosaic ar- rangement of pictures displayed on white
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