Frida Kahlo: Strong soul, weak body

A tragic bus accident in 1925 when she was 18, left Frida with a fractured spine, a crushed pelvis, and broken foot. She was to remain partially handicapped and in pain for the rest of her life. This life-changing event set in motion the practice of faithfully recording the painful episodes of her life through her art. Many of her works focus on her pain and the multiple surgeries that she endured. The Broken Column of 1944 shows her wearing the backbrace that appears regularly in her paintings:

Broken Column of 1944

 Images of the suffering of Christ and the Saints surrounded the traditional Mexican Catholics in their spiritual life. The message taught by the Church was to learn to endure the pain and hardship and be prepared to suffer and sacrifice as Christ and his Martyrs did. Despite the intense pain undoubtedly the result of their torture, Christ and his Matryrs confront the faithful with their expressionless stares. Her Broken Column can be traced back through the Mexican Catholic art to its European sources in images like Andrea Mantegna's Saint Sebastian

The Henry Ford Hospital, 1932.

Source: http://employees.oneonta.edu/farberas/arth/arth200/women/kahlo.html


We have selected Frida Kahlo's work beacause she was a woman that lived in alot of physical and emotional pain but was strong-willed. Her physical fragility is a common theme in her paintings, she portrayed her weak nude body but the expression of her face was always strong, it showed almost no emotion and no pain. She was an amazing woman that nonthe less all the suffering she manage to live an extraordinary life. She had a weak body but her robust soul allowed her to go on with her life.