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ART & ARTISTS: Frida Kahlo

Self portrait with necklace.

Image of the artist:

Who is Frida Kahlo?

Mexican artist Frida Kahlo is remembered for her self-potraits, pain and passion, and bold, vibrant colours.  She is celebrated in Mexico for her attention to Mexican and indigenous culture and by feminists for her depiction of the female experience and form.

Kahlo, who suffered from polio as a child, nearly died in a bus accident as a teenager.  She suffered multiple fractures of her spine, collarbone and ribs, a shattered pelvis, broken foot and dislocated shoulder.  She began to focus heavily on painting while recovering in a body cast.  In her lifetime, she had 30 operations.

Life experience is a common theme in Kahlo's approximately 200 paintings, sketches and drawings. Her physical and emotional pain are depicted starkly on canvases, as is her turbulent relationship with her husband, fellow artist Diego Rivera, whom she marries twice.  Of her 143 paintings, 55 are self portraits.

Documents the career of Frida Kahlo - the first modern Mexican painter to be hung in the Louvre, and looks at her relationship to avant-garde art, from Cubism to Surrealism to the Mexican Mural Movement.

SOURCE: The Life and Times of Frida Kahlo, 2004, ABC on ClickvIew [Rated PG; 1:28:58 mins]

Focuses on telling the story of Mexican artist, Frida Kahlo, in her own words using extracts from her diary. Since her death, she has become an iconic figure and world-renowned artist in the past three decades or so. But when she died in 1954, at age 47, she was barely known outside fairly narrow artistic and intellectual circles. 

SOURCE: Frida Kahlo - Between Passion and Pain, 2007, SBS on ClickView [Rated PG; 54:26 mins]

Paintings

eBooks: EBSCO

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