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Brooklyn Museum

Uncompromising Identity: Frida Kahlo at The Brooklyn Museum

March 19, 2019 By Sofia Pipolo Filed Under: Reviews, The Arts Tagged With: Art, art and media, Brooklyn Museum, exhibition review, frida kahlo, sofia pipolo

Frida in New York, 1946. Nicholas Muray

Known for housing extraordinary exhibitions of art and media, The Brooklyn Museum has always brought history and contemporary culture together in unique perspectives. Frida Kahlo: Appearances Can Be Deceiving (running from February 8th to May 12th, 2018) is no different. 

If you are expecting to see rows of Frida Kahlo’s beautiful, colorfully painted self-portraits you will not find them here. Instead, for the first time in the United States, the exhibition displays the iconic artist’s trove of personal photographs, clothing, and belongings.

After her death in 1954, these possessions were locked away under the instruction of her husband, muralist Diego Rivera. Fifty years later, uncovered from her life long home, Casa Azul, The Blue House in Mexico City, they now lay on display to explore Frida’s work in relation to that which surrounded her. This framing is what makes the exhibition at the Brooklyn Museum so unique. With only twelve of her paintings within the 350 objects, the exhibition itself questions what is more important- the art or the artist? 

Frida painted her image in the same manner that she presented herself every day. In both appearance and art, she dressed in the fashion of the indigenous Tehuantepec women of Southern Mexico; with her long enagua skirts, huipil square cut tunic, and braided hair decorated with blooming flowers. She challenged the growing Euro-centric beauty standards by noticeably darkening her skin in paintings and highlightings her thick facial hair and eyebrows; while also celebrating her femininity, wearing traditional lace resplandor garments. The ruffled white lace framing her done-up face like a flower. These hand-made dresses are featured in personal photographs and on petite mannequins complete with floral headdresses and heavy pendant jewelry. No two dresses similar in detailed design. 

Her appearance cemented her identity with Mexico motivated by her personal, political, and artistic convictions. Raised by a mother of Indigenous and Spanish descent and German immigrant father against the backdrop of the Mexican Revolution, Frida became educated in her Mexican heritage both colonial and modernist. She contracted Polio at a young age and later suffered a broken spine and injuries in a severe trolly accident. She began painting, fixated on her own image in the mirror as she lay hospitalized for months. These injuries would stay with her, causing her several miscarriages and need for abortions. She joined the Mexican Communist Party in 1928, immersing herself in political and intellectual issues alongside her husband, Diego Rivera. She also took a leading role in the Mexican Muralist Movement. 

Diego on My Mind, (Self-portrait as Tehuana), 1943

Seen in the love letter from photographer Nickolas Murray- with whom she had an on and off affair- he, maybe ironically, applauds Frida for her devotion. Frida Kahlo had a strong devotion to herself- her identity, her beliefs, and above all her art as she painted her way through pain, love, heartache, and joy. Never giving up or compromising on her own image, Frida meticulously crafted a visualization of her identity.

From the small Aztec sculptures to her painted diary entries, this personal story is told with each piece in the collection. Showcased at the center of the exhibition is the pink lace garment and flower headpiece she dons in the self-portrait Diego on My Mind (1943). The huipil grande headdress, a defining accessory of Tehuantepec women, was found on a statue of the Virgin Mary, attracting visitors to gather round. Contrastingly, the actual painting featuring the garment, complete with gold leaf and Diego’s figure above Frida’s striking brow, is tucked in the corner of the room. 

Plaster corset, painted and decorated by Frida Kahlo.

Under the square tunic blouses, Frida wore an orthopedic, leather-bound corset that assisted in supporting her fragile spine and back. Pages of medical reports and documents give information on her clinical history are uncovered. Her prosthetic leg with traditional Chinese fashion inspired laced up boots, which she strategically hid from prying audiences under her large skirt, come to light. Also displayed are Frida’s plaster cast corsets covered in some of her first paintings composed as she lay after surgery with a mirror about her body. On one she paints a fetus over her abdomen, another a gaping empty space on the stomach. One other features her spine as a broken column cracking and crumbling to dust. On two she paints a large, red Communist hammer and sickle over her heart. Frida, herself, chose to keep these casts once they were taken off, perhaps as a way to remember and document the suffering she endured which worked to fuel her creative energy. A surrealist drawing from her diary shows her as a one-legged child, inscribed “Feet, What Do I Need Them for If I Have Wings to Fly?” 

So with her art, and furthermore her everyday life, is Frida daring us to be bold and live to outwardly express ourselves?

Frida’s image was conscious, considerate, complex, and strategic. In photographs, she posed in such a way to hide her disability, but even that which was private and purposefully covered up was essential to her identity. Contrastingly from these private elements, greenstone and jade beads, finely carved rings, silver earrings, and heavy gold Tehuana necklaces materialize under glass cases. Some would say this heavy jewelry and flower crowns would upstage the young artist’s petite figure, but others saw the significance of the overpowering look. Each beautifully crafted works of art in themselves, which Frida was adamant to decorate herself with. Personal photographs document her enjoying Mexico City’s markets and the purchases she made there- rings, dolls, and decorative trinkets. Frida was known never to barter for goods, indicating a belief in the value of material things. 

She cultivated these purchases in a collection of gems, clothing, writing, sculptures, and even animals at The Blue House. Often housebound due to her disabilities, Frida created a microcosm of Mexico within her own home. Filled with craftsmanship that celebrated Mexican history and culture, every element that influenced her life came together in The Blue House. There she cared for monkeys and other animals as pets- or perhaps as surrogate children-, decorated with Olmec figures as her alter egos, and hung mirrors around every corner to compose her appearance throughout the day. Appearances Can Be Deceiving gives us a glimpse into the highly detailed world Frida cultivated- a treasure trove of her integrated parts of her life, art, and identity. 

Just as the objects around her were important, so were the people. Frida surrounded herself with like-minded artists and individuals that helped to record her artistic legacy. The influence from her parents, her sister- who had an affair with her husband-, American photographers Lous Pachard and Imagen Cunningham, and of course her husband, Diego Rivera. About him, the subject of many of her paintings, Frida writes, “I suffered two grave accidents in my life. One in which a streetcar knocked me down… The other is Diego.” Referred to by their family as “an elephant and a dove,” the exhibition has hundreds of photos and films of the couple painting, at political events, traveling, and living in The Blue House together. In the press, Frida was often referred to in relation to her husband. It is interesting enough to wonder if Frida knew that in the future her name would largely mean more to us than his. But maybe she did as she stated seemingly realizing her own importance and iconic image, “All the painters want me to pose for them.” 

Photographer Imagen Cunningham said that people marveled over Frida’s appearance when she came to the United States. And how is that any different from today? As I walked through the museum, I came across a young woman dressed as Frida Kahlo, in full hair, makeup, and costume. Still today the bright, beautifully woven colors and patterns of the Tehuantepec style highly contrast the black, solid prints of modern New York fashion. Ironically enough, the one black colored dress in the exhibition, Frida wore to a New York art show and dinner event in 1933. From her fiery red lipstick to her embroidered skirts, to her shoes from New York or San Fransisco’s Chinatown to her iconic unibrow, Frida’s appearance was truly her own. 

Installation view, Frida Kahlo: Appearances Can Be Deceiving, Brooklyn Museum, February 8 – May 12, 2019 (Photo: Jonathan Dorado)

No piece of her was without thought. In mind, body, and appearance, Frida was aware that every part of her being brought about her values and message. Whether she cared if we agreed or not, Frida worked for others to know who she was through her open visual identity. Proving this, on the back of her mother’s First Holy Communion photo Frida writes in pen “Idiota!”. She has even stated, “I do not like to be considered religious. I like people to know I am not.”

So with her art, and furthermore her everyday life, is Frida daring us to be bold and live to outwardly express ourselves? Or did she simply not care about us- the audience- using her self portraits and painting as just another way to curate her uncompromising identity? If so, what does this exhibition signify- where do the importance and meaning lie in these personal belongings? The title of this exhibition, Appearances Can Be Deceiving, suggests that there is more to what is outwardly presented. So if Frida was in fact so adamant about visually presenting and cultivating her identity, what deeper truths are there to be uncovered? I urge you to visit this must-see exhibition at The Brooklyn Museum with these questions in mind as you walk through surrounded by the same items and objects that Frida Kahlo chose to surround herself with.

Filed Under: Reviews, The Arts Tagged With: Art, art and media, Brooklyn Museum, exhibition review, frida kahlo, sofia pipolo

A Year of Yes at the Brooklyn Museum

April 26, 2017 By Meghan Cook Filed Under: Reader Profile Tagged With: Art, black women, Brooklyn Museum, Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminist Art, feminism, feminist movement

A Conversation with Brooklyn Museum Curator Catherine Morris

For the ten-year anniversary of the Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminist Art, Brooklyn Museum curator Catherine Morris planned a series of exhibitions titled A Year of Yes: Reimagining Feminism, which would begin in October 2016 and end in early 2018. The various exhibits would examine artwork, social movements, and historical periods with a keen feminist eye. When reflecting on the past decade and the ways in which society and media had gradually come to accept feminist methodology more and more, Morris was struck by a thought: how long does a place like the Sackler center need to exist? Is there a day when we will no longer need a center devoted to preserving and educating the public on feminist art?

She did not have to wait long for an answer. In early November, Marilyn Minter’s: Pretty/Dirty exhibit was underway, and Morris and her fellow coordinators looked on with pride. They expected Marilyn Minter’s examination of female body image in America to coincide with a Hillary Clinton presidency; a retrospective on the commercialization and objectification of the female form timely paired with a much-anticipated first female presidency. The coincidental juxtaposition of the two would have in and of itself been a lesson, a lesson that boldly said, “Look how far we’ve come!” Instead, when Election Day arrived the lesson became, “There is still so much left to do.”

 

Marilyn Minter’s Blue Poles from Marilyn Minter: Pretty/Dirty.

 

Morris no longer feels like she needs to question the existence of the Sackler Center; she sees Donald Trump’s presidency as a confirmation of its necessity. “I have to say, since November 8, I don’t want to have that conversation anymore,” said Morris. “That day answered that question for me, at least right now, and for the next four years.”

Morris went on to discuss how the election results shifted the intention and reception of A Year of Yes’s programming. Minter’s show took on an entirely new energy, and suddenly became one that “needed to protest, to talk, to strategize.” Alternatively, the concepts and themes conveyed in another show, We Wanted a Revolution: Black Radical Women 1965-85, felt eerily prescient. It is difficult to ignore how, overwhelmingly, white women voted for Trump while a majority of black women voted for Clinton, statistics which reveal in Morris’ mind, “that kind of contested relationship between women who on so many agenda levels want to be allies” but find themselves separated “in a politically divided and racially fraught moment.”

 

Faith Ringgold’s Early Works #25: Self-Portrait, 1965 from We Wanted a Revolution: Black Radical Women 1965-85.

 

We Wanted a Revolution, which opens April 21, details how the feminist movement emerged in African-American communities in the sixties and examines what Morris openly identified as an “uncomfortable relationship between women of color who did not necessarily always feel welcome, understood, or even heard, within the context of second-wave feminism which was largely white, middle-class, post-college degree-[holding] women.” Morris noted that it is worth looking at both feminist history and its present-day practice with a critical eye, cracking it open to point out the flaws that lie within. Even Minter often faced criticism from fellow women for her artwork, despite being an outspoken and self-identifying feminist herself. “Feminism is not a monolithic thing,” insisted Morris. “It is in fact, intersectional in and of itself, and is only enriched by having these complicated discussions.”

Even the word feminism itself carries a weighted and complex history. While men and women alike once balked at the word, which evinced mental images of enraged women brandishing burning bras, it has come a long way in the national lexicon. It still faces criticism, but it also holds a new status in the media, with pop culture icons like Beyonce and Taylor Swift declaring themselves feminist as mass crowds of impressionable girls look on in admiration. Morris said in her lifetime, “the ebb and flowing of the term is enormous” and it has gotten to a point where “in the digital era, its value changes from week to week.”

For her, this is evidence of the word’s importance, even if some view it as radical or demeaning towards men. “We also are acknowledging the fact that even if the term is problematic, the impulse towards gender equity or parity is certainly a human rights issue that I think you’d be very hard pressed to find anybody say they didn’t agree with,” reasoned Morris. “Different people just have different ways of defining it, contextualizing it, being comfortable with it.”

This range in interpretation and definition extends to the series of exhibits themselves. Despite varying subject matter, the exhibitions are all tied together by the unique tools feminism has provided historians; one of the most important of these tools being historical revisionism, which allows canonical histories to be rewritten. Consider Judy Chicago’s The Dinner Party (1974-79), a commemorative art piece depicting a banquet with a place setting reserved for thirty nine women of historical importance. Morris explained that “even in the earliest moments of second wave feminism, artists, curators, and historians were really wanting to change history; to talk about the people who were overlooked and put them back into it.”

 

Piece by Amarna King from A Woman’s Afterlife: Gender Transformation in Ancient Egypt.

 

Historical revisionism also helps to understand the past in new ways. For instance, A Woman’s Afterlife: Gender Transformation in Ancient Egypt may look back on a time period when feminism did not yet exist, but it proves that exploration of a subject through a particular lens can unearth new discoveries. Morris said that with more women entering the field of Egyptology, unique conclusions are being drawn by archaeologists who are able to “look at things differently and ask certain questions, and as a result, get different answers.”

Morris hopes that those who come to the Brooklyn Museum to experience any of A Year of Yes’ many exhibits leave with a new understanding of the world around them and recognize the value of making room for other people’s stories. The driving force of the exhibition series is to be a space of inclusion and education. “I think that as I have said many, many, times I am really proud to be the curator of the Center of Feminist Art and not the Center of Women’s Art,” said Morris. “I think feminism applies to everybody.”

 

Upcoming and ongoing exhibitions:

Infinite Blue (Nov. 25, 2016 – Nov. 5, 2017)

A Woman’s Afterlife: Gender Transformation in Ancient Egypt (Dec. 15, 2016 – ongoing)

Georgia O’Keefe: Living Modern (March 3, 2017 – July 23, 2017)

Utopia Station (March 2017 – ongoing)

We Wanted a Revolution: Black Radical Women, 1965-85 (April 21, 2017 – Sept. 17, 2017)

The Roots of “The Dinner Party” (Oct. 20, 2017 – early 2018)

A Feminist Timeline (Oct. 20, 2017 – early 2018)

 

https://www.brooklynmuseum.org/exhibitions/year_of_yes_reimagining_feminism

Filed Under: Reader Profile Tagged With: Art, black women, Brooklyn Museum, Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminist Art, feminism, feminist movement

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