Pain In Frida Kahlo's Naive Art

Frida Kahlo was a brilliant Mexican artist whose works of art reflect her life emotionally and physically hard. Better known for her self-portraits, the added depth and tone that Kahlo brought to her surrealist paintings gained her critical acclaim. A part of the Naive art period, Kahlo lacked formal schooling yet showed the technique on par with sophisticated artists. Kahlo was influenced by indigenous Mexican culture. This is depicted by her use of bright colors and symbolism within her works of art. Kahlo's life was marked by the physical challenges that created the emotional pain she felt as well. Being the most well known and largest painting of her repertoire, Frida Kahlo’s The Two Fridas encompassed all the style of Naive art. Connecting to her experiences and using symbolism allowed Kahlo to reveal vulnerability and emotion to the highest magnitude.

Born in Mexico in 1907, she was a child when she was afflicted with poliomyelitis. At eighteen, Kahlo's life changed as a result of an accident. A collision between a bus and a street barrow caused a handrail to pierce Kahlo’s

body destructively. Due to this event she would have physical pain continuously and could have no children. She took this distress and emotions from this loss and represented it in her work.
Additionally, Kahlo's emotional life was grounded by her physical life. A relationship with artist Diego Rivera brought a marriage, a divorce and re-union, as well as constant moving for Diego to work. This constant moving combined with the turbulent marriage, prompted Kahlo to reflect on her life, reflections that manifested into her art. The Two Fridas is a classic example of the hardship Kahlo conveyed in her art. Painted in 1939, Kahlo began painting just as she divorced from Diego Rivera. Due to the hardship and emotional wreckage she experienced, The Two Fridas began its journey.
I chose the painting ultimately as an ode to my culture and roots. Being raised in a different lifestyle than that in Mexico, I had always felt distant and awkward towards Mexican culture. The painting, however, gave me a sort of connection that I related to intrinsically. A startling and intriguing self-portrait, the primitive nature of the painting reveals two images of the artist. Both of the Frida’s are holding hands, both of which have similar facial expressions, yet are dressed entirely differently, revealing two different identities.
Facing severe emotional hardships, Kahlo was experiencing an identity crisis.

No longer a wife or a lover, who was she to be? Having two different heritages, she could no longer bear the implications of being both, forcing herself to choose. The painting illustrating a literal split between her two selves is from this period of turmoil and self-doubt. As her pain, her confusion is depicted by the gloomy sky, I began to see the connection I could not see before. Being American and Mexican, it has always been hard to distinguish myself from others. I never knew whether to be proud of my culture or ashamed of it, as many ridiculed how Mexicans lived. Much like The Two Fridas, I eventually split myself into two, turning each identity off and on to accommodate others around me. I saw and felt Kahlo's pain and confusion which is why I could appreciate it so much more than any other

individual.
As I could see the vulnerability of Kahlo, a poem by Abhimanyu Kumar, Identity, saw it as well. The poem reflects the daze of being lost and how it can cause so much more to happen. This confusion is revealed when the poem states, “You have all lost me, lost your identity in my life” (Kumar). Tantamount to Kahlo’s piece, the poem goes through the motions of losing sense of all the things in life. Everything just becomes a blur. And with nothing to hold onto, these two artists expressed their emotions through the mediums of poetry and art.
Frida Kahlo existed in a society that expected her to to be conform patriarchal structures. The circumstances of her life, however, would never allow for that. Each person is affected by a lifetime of individual experiences. Kahlo, was affected with more pain and suffering that no one should experience. By channeling her feelings into her art, she found solace in that even though it seemed she had no one, she had only herself.