Content area
Full Text
Frida Kahlo's tragic portraits expose her turbulent life.
GCSE art pupils must learn to contextualise the works they study. Who was the artist? Why did they choose certain subjects? What were their beliefs? What was their life like and how do their paintings represent this?
The work of few artists lends itself so well to such analysis as that of the unconventional Mexican painter Frida Kahlo. Born in Coyoacan in 1907, she became an icon of Mexican culture and has been the subject of exhibitions and films worldwide.
A third of her 55 paintings were self-portraits. However, this was less due to vanity than an attempt to show how tragic experiences affected her: she had polio as a child...