OK, here is what I came up with for my Frida Kahlo speech on Monday. It will be accompanied by the visual aid I made (it's the last pic in My Pics; a little blurry but you get the idea). I haven't ran through it yet, but plan on trying it out on Mom and Byron this weekend. It's supposed to be 5-6 minutes long. Hope it makes some kind of sense... Oh, and my thesis statement is that the two main influences on her work were her bus accident at age 18 and her marriage to Diego Rivera.
They thought I was a Surrealist, but I wasnt. I never painted dreams. I painted my own reality. This was Frida Kahlos assessment of her unique artistic vision. This Mexican artist transformed the tragedies and hardships of her life into some of the most challenging and deeply personal artwork of the 20th century. Challenging because much of her work is raw and primitive Frida did not paint pretty pictures. Deeply personal because rarely has an artist invited her audience to become witnesses to the events of her life through her art in such an honest, forthright way. And the events of Frida Kahlos life might very well have destroyed a lesser woman. Perhaps you saw the recent film biography of Frida starring Selma Hayek (I believe it just came out on video). I very much enjoyed the film and felt that it gave an accurate and very artistic picture of her life and her art. Frida herself, I feel certain, would have approved.
Frida Kahlo was born on July 6, 1907, in Coyoacan, Mexico. She was especially close to her father, a German national of Hungarian Jewish descent who was an architectural photographer and an amateur artist. Young Frida often accompanied her father on trips to the countryside, where he would go to paint.
After a bout with polio at age 6, Frida threw herself into her schoolwork and aspired to become a doctor. But it was not to be. A terrible event took place during her student days that changed her life forever. This occurrence was the first of the two major influences on her art, the other being her marriage to and relationship with the great Mexican muralist Diego Rivera. But first let me describe the events of the afternoon of September 17, 1925.
On this fateful day, the city bus that Frida was riding home from school was struck by a streetcar. Frida was severely injured. Hayden Herrera, author of what is perhaps the definitive Frida Kahlo biography, describes her injuries in horrific detail: Her spinal column was broken in three places in the lumbar region. Her collarbone was broken, and her third and fourth ribs. Her right leg had eleven fractures and her right foot was dislocated and crushed. Her left shoulder was out of joint, her pelvis broken in three places. [A] steel handrail had literally skewered her body at the level of the abdomen; entering on the left side, it had come out through the vagina. I lost my virginity, she said.
Frankly, it is a miracle she survived this ordeal, and her recovery, although never total, is a testament to her strength and determination. During the year following the accident, she was in and out of the hospital many times. The extent of her injuries required her to lay immobile for long periods of time. It was during these times that she began to paint it kept her occupied, gave her a creative outlet, and kept her from going completely insane (I believe today they would call it processing). As you can imagine, she suffered from chronic pain for the rest of her life, and required many subsequent hospitalizations and surgeries. She expressed her physical anguish in many of her paintings, such as The Broken Column and The Wounded Deer.
The accident, however, was only the beginning. The other great influence on Frida Kahlos artistic expression was her marriage to Diego Rivera. Frida once said, I suffered two grave accidents in my life. One in which a streetcar knocked me down The other accident is Diego. He was 20 years her senior, a notorious womanizer, and was considered at the time Mexicos greatest living artist. They were married for the first time on Aug. 21, 1929, divorced 10 years later, and remarried a year after that. Yes, they had one of those relationships they couldnt live with each other, and they couldnt live without each other. Their marriage was stormy, to say the least, with many infidelities on both sides, but through it all they remained devoted to one another. Rivera was not only her husband but also her teacher and mentor; he encouraged her in her work and raised her political consciousness. Frida longed to have children with Rivera, but obviously she was unable to do so due to the extent of her injuries. She suffered several miscarriages, the first of which she addressed in the painting Henry Ford Hospital in 1932. Many of her paintings during this time reflected her conflicting emotions regarding her relationship with Rivera, and her despair over not being able to bear children.
Frida did explore other themes in her art over the years, such as her identity as a Mexican, her political views (she was an ardent Marxist/Stalinist) and her relationship to the natural world. But nothing permeated her work quite as much as the bus accident and her marriage to Diego Rivera. Her art was both a reaction to and a manifestation of these two profoundly life-changing and life-shaping events. Her indomitable spirit and strength in the face of such challenges are remarkably inspiring. Shortly before her death on July 13, 1954, Frida Kahlo said, In spite of my long illness, I feel immense joy in LIVING.
They thought I was a Surrealist, but I wasnt. I never painted dreams. I painted my own reality. This was Frida Kahlos assessment of her unique artistic vision. This Mexican artist transformed the tragedies and hardships of her life into some of the most challenging and deeply personal artwork of the 20th century. Challenging because much of her work is raw and primitive Frida did not paint pretty pictures. Deeply personal because rarely has an artist invited her audience to become witnesses to the events of her life through her art in such an honest, forthright way. And the events of Frida Kahlos life might very well have destroyed a lesser woman. Perhaps you saw the recent film biography of Frida starring Selma Hayek (I believe it just came out on video). I very much enjoyed the film and felt that it gave an accurate and very artistic picture of her life and her art. Frida herself, I feel certain, would have approved.
Frida Kahlo was born on July 6, 1907, in Coyoacan, Mexico. She was especially close to her father, a German national of Hungarian Jewish descent who was an architectural photographer and an amateur artist. Young Frida often accompanied her father on trips to the countryside, where he would go to paint.
After a bout with polio at age 6, Frida threw herself into her schoolwork and aspired to become a doctor. But it was not to be. A terrible event took place during her student days that changed her life forever. This occurrence was the first of the two major influences on her art, the other being her marriage to and relationship with the great Mexican muralist Diego Rivera. But first let me describe the events of the afternoon of September 17, 1925.
On this fateful day, the city bus that Frida was riding home from school was struck by a streetcar. Frida was severely injured. Hayden Herrera, author of what is perhaps the definitive Frida Kahlo biography, describes her injuries in horrific detail: Her spinal column was broken in three places in the lumbar region. Her collarbone was broken, and her third and fourth ribs. Her right leg had eleven fractures and her right foot was dislocated and crushed. Her left shoulder was out of joint, her pelvis broken in three places. [A] steel handrail had literally skewered her body at the level of the abdomen; entering on the left side, it had come out through the vagina. I lost my virginity, she said.
Frankly, it is a miracle she survived this ordeal, and her recovery, although never total, is a testament to her strength and determination. During the year following the accident, she was in and out of the hospital many times. The extent of her injuries required her to lay immobile for long periods of time. It was during these times that she began to paint it kept her occupied, gave her a creative outlet, and kept her from going completely insane (I believe today they would call it processing). As you can imagine, she suffered from chronic pain for the rest of her life, and required many subsequent hospitalizations and surgeries. She expressed her physical anguish in many of her paintings, such as The Broken Column and The Wounded Deer.
The accident, however, was only the beginning. The other great influence on Frida Kahlos artistic expression was her marriage to Diego Rivera. Frida once said, I suffered two grave accidents in my life. One in which a streetcar knocked me down The other accident is Diego. He was 20 years her senior, a notorious womanizer, and was considered at the time Mexicos greatest living artist. They were married for the first time on Aug. 21, 1929, divorced 10 years later, and remarried a year after that. Yes, they had one of those relationships they couldnt live with each other, and they couldnt live without each other. Their marriage was stormy, to say the least, with many infidelities on both sides, but through it all they remained devoted to one another. Rivera was not only her husband but also her teacher and mentor; he encouraged her in her work and raised her political consciousness. Frida longed to have children with Rivera, but obviously she was unable to do so due to the extent of her injuries. She suffered several miscarriages, the first of which she addressed in the painting Henry Ford Hospital in 1932. Many of her paintings during this time reflected her conflicting emotions regarding her relationship with Rivera, and her despair over not being able to bear children.
Frida did explore other themes in her art over the years, such as her identity as a Mexican, her political views (she was an ardent Marxist/Stalinist) and her relationship to the natural world. But nothing permeated her work quite as much as the bus accident and her marriage to Diego Rivera. Her art was both a reaction to and a manifestation of these two profoundly life-changing and life-shaping events. Her indomitable spirit and strength in the face of such challenges are remarkably inspiring. Shortly before her death on July 13, 1954, Frida Kahlo said, In spite of my long illness, I feel immense joy in LIVING.
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Urm...not literally dead of course...I don't know how well that would do for your marks. I mean...a corpse in the classroom and all...and I'm rambling...sorry...