Frida Kahlo

Frida Kahlo, 1907-1954 the well known Mexican artist, just as known for her colourful ensembles and flower crowns as her coloured self portraits

Above: Self portrait with thorn necklace and hummingbird

Growing up when she did in Mexico, against the backdrop of the Mexican Revolution, she contracted Polio in her childhood, leaving her right leg thinner than her left. 

Then on September 17, 1925, Kahlo was in a horrific accident when the bus she was in collided with a trolley car. The injuries she suffered included: a broken collarbone, broken pelvis, broken spinal column, broken ribs, 11 fractures in her right leg, crushed and dislocated right foot and a dislocated shoulder. She also was impaled through her abdomen and uterus with an iron handrail, this compromised her reproductive capacity.

Though she survived, she was left in pain from her injuries for the rest of her life. For 3 months she was recovering in a full body cast. Relapses of pain plagued her the rest of her life, leaving her in hospital or bedridden for months at a time. After multiple operations, her injuries prevented her from ever having children, she conceived 3 times and all her pregnancies had to be terminated. 

Above: What the water gave me. Yes, Florence wrote this song about it.

During her time whilst immobilised, she painted. 

Her up and down relationship with her husband, the painter Diego Rivera has been well documented in many books, documentaries, films. They both had plenty of extra marital relationships, but Rivera also admitted to one with Frida's younger sister. What a life to get through. 

Suicide of Dorothy Hale, also a story within itself worth reading. 

The Little Deer, 1946. 

One doesn't really need an artistic poncery background to imagine what any of those arrows in her side could represent.

We really are lucky that some people can turn their pain into something so beautiful for the world to see and lament. It feels so voyeuristic and wrong at times? Eventually everyone gets peace in the end, don't they?

Info from wiki and, intermanets in general. Tumblr the pics

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