Synopses & Reviews
Pain and passion: The original and intimate art of Mexico’s most famous female painter The arresting pictures of
Frida Kahlo (1907–54) were in many ways expressions of trauma. Through a near-fatal road accident at the age of 18, failing health, a turbulent marriage, miscarriage and childlessness, she
transformed the afflictions into revolutionary art.In literal or metaphorical self-portraiture, Kahlo looks out at the viewer with an audacious glare, rejecting her destiny as a passive victim and rather intertwining expressions of her experience into a
hybrid surreal-real language of living: hair, roots, veins, vines, tendrils and fallopian tubes. Many of her works also explore the
Communist political idealswhich Kahlo shared with Rivera. The artist described her paintings as
“the most sincere and real thing that I could do in order to express what I felt inside and outside of myself.”This book introduces a rich body of Kahlo’s work to explore her unremitting determination as an artist, and her significance as a painter, feminist icon, and a pioneer of Latin American culture.
About the Series:Each book in TASCHEN’s Basic Art series features:
- a detailed chronological summary of the life and oeuvre of the artist, covering his or her cultural and historical importance
- a concise biography
- approximately 100 illustrations with explanatory captions
Synopsis
Pain and passion: The original and intimate art of Mexico's most famous female painter The arresting pictures of
Frida Kahlo (1907-54) were in many ways expressions of trauma. Through a near-fatal road accident at the age of 18, failing health, a turbulent marriage, miscarriage and childlessness, she
transformed the afflictions into revolutionary art.In literal or metaphorical self-portraiture, Kahlo looks out at the viewer with an audacious glare, rejecting her destiny as a passive victim and rather intertwining expressions of her experience into a
hybrid surreal-real language of living hair, roots, veins, vines, tendrils and fallopian tubes. Many of her works also explore the
Communist political ideals which Kahlo shared with Rivera. The artist described her paintings as
"the most sincere and real thing that I could do in order to express what I felt inside and outside of myself."This book introduces a rich body of Kahlo's work to explore her unremitting determination as an artist, and her significance as a painter, feminist icon, and a pioneer of Latin American culture.
About the Series: Each book in TASCHEN's Basic Art series features:
- a detailed chronological summary of the life and oeuvre of the artist, covering his or her cultural and historical importance
- a concise biography
- approximately 100 illustrations with explanatory captions
Synopsis
The arresting pictures of Frida Kahlo (1907-54) were in many ways expressions of trauma. Through a near-fatal road accident at the age of 18, failing health, a turbulent marriage, miscarriage and childlessness, she transformed the afflictions into revolutionary art.
In literal or metaphorical self-portraiture, Kahlo looks out at the viewer with an audacious glare, rejecting her destiny as a passive victim and rather intertwining expressions of her experience into a hybrid real-surreal language of living: hair, roots, veins, vines, tendrils and fallopian tubes. Many of her works also explore the Communist political ideals which Kahlo shared with her husband Diego Rivera. The artist described her paintings as "the most sincere and real thing that I could do in order to express what I felt inside and outside of myself."
This book introduces the rich body of Kahlo's work to explore her unremitting determination as an artist, and her significance as a painter, feminist icon, and a pioneer of Latin American culture.
About the series
Each book in TASCHEN's Basic Art series features:
a detailed chronological summary of the life and oeuvre of the artist, covering his or her cultural and historical importance
a concise biography
approximately 100 illustrations with explanatory captions
Synopsis
Pain and passion: The original and intimate art of Mexico’s most famous female painter Frida Kahlo’s arresting pictures were in many ways expressions of trauma. The daughter of an immigrant German photographer father and a Mexican mother of Indian origin, Kahlo (1907–1954) was involved in a serious road accident at the age of 18, which left her with lifelong health problems, including the inability to have a child.
This richly illustrated Basic Art book offers a both accessible and informed introduction to Kahlo’s life and work, looking at the artist’s dramatic, colorful canvases which combined religious Mexican tradition with Surrealist elements. These paintings can be seen as reflections both of Kahlo’s physical distress and of her volatile marriage to world-famous mural painter Diego Rivera—a tumultuous relationship fraught with furious tempers, numerous extra marital affairs, divorce, and remarriage. Many works also explore the Communist political ideals Kahlo and Rivera shared.
Kahlo’s work received posthumous recognition in the late 1970s and was declared the property of the Mexican state in 1983. Today, she is considered one of the most important 20th-century painters, a feminist icon, and a pioneer of Latin American art.
About the Author
Andrea Kettenmann (born in 1959) studied art history in Gießen, Göttingen and Heidelberg before joining the art history department of the University of Hamburg. In 1986 she visited Mexico on a fellowship, and now lives there, working as a freelance art historian. She has now worked on a number of exhibitions and catalogues, including the catalogue for the retrospective on Diego Rivera, Frida Kahlo's husband, in Detroit.