KAHLO
“They thought I was a Surrealist, but I wasn’t. I never painted dreams. I painted my own reality”
Frida Kahlo is an icon of womanhood and female creativity. She known for her strength, confronting of her pains, her self portraits and her way of life. She has been described as a Surrealist, a natural Surrealist but she claimed to only paint her own reality. Already as a young woman she hung out with intellectually like-minded students, was politically active and part of the Mexican Communist Party. In the not un-complicated relationship with artist Diego Rivera they shared visual honesty, they both had relationships outside the marriage, they lead separate lives – divorced and got married again. He called her an artistic genius.
Swedish Eva Zetterman wrote her thesis on Kahlo and describes her, instead of unhappy and filled with pain, as independent, brave and with a refreshing disrespect for authorities. According to Zetterman, the stories about Kahlos miscarriage and unwanted childlessness was also wrong – rather she did several self-chosen abortions.
We thank Kahlo for leading the way in questions that are still as important – ethnicity and the female role.