At the Quirinal Stables a major exhibition of Mexican artist Frida Kahlo (1907-1954), symbol of the artistic and exuberance of Mexican culture of the twentieth century.
There is no doubt that the myth formed around the figure and work of Frida Kahlo (1907-1954) has now assumed a global dimension; undisputed icon of twentieth-century Mexican culture, revered forerunner of the feminist movement, cult brand merchandising universal seductive subject of Hollywood cinema, Frida Kahlo is offered to contemporary culture through an inextricable link between art and life the most fascinating in the history of the twentieth century. Yet her paintings are not only the mirror of his life story, marked focus from physical and psychological injuries suffered in the terrible accident in which she was involved at the age of 17 years. Her art blends with the history and spirit of the world to her contemporary , reflecting the social and cultural transformations that led to the Mexican Revolution , and that it followed. It was the revolutionary spirit that led to the appreciation of the indigenous past and folk traditions, understood as irrepressible identity codes generators of an unprecedented fusion of self-expression and language, the imagery, the colors and symbols of Mexican popular culture. At the same time Frida is an expression of the artistic and cultural exuberance of her time and the study of her work is used to intersect the trajectories of all the major international cultural movements that crossed the Mexico of her time: from revolutionary to pauperism ‘ Estridentismo and Surrealism to what decades later would take the name of magic Realism. The exhibition aims to bring together around a body of masterpieces from the major collections which, key works from other public and private collections in Mexico, the United States, Europe. The project is completed, a selection of photographic portraits, including those made by Nickolas Muray in the forties, as indispensable as striking complement to the art of Frida Kahlo in terms of codification iconography of the character. If in fact the exhibition intends to present and develop the artistic production of Frida Kahlo in its evolution, from the beginning debit balance of the New Objectivity and Magic Realism in the folk revival of art and ancestral reflections of American realism of the twenties and thirties (Edward Hopper, Charles Sheeler, Georgia O’Keefe ) to the components of political ideology inspired by the Mexican mural ( Rivera, Orozco ), is the theme of self-representation to prevail in this exhibition project, both in respect of the numerical weight that the kind of “self-portrait” assumes in the overall production of the artist, and – above all – for the very special meaning that it has been in the transmission of iconographic values, psychological and cultural features of the “myth Frida”.
The design of the exhibition and the catalog is curated by Helga Prignitz – Poda, accredited specialist work of Frida Kahlo, author with Salomon Grimberg and Andrea Kettenmann of the catalog raisonné of the artist in 1988.
For more information about the exhibition please read the following link.