Frida Kahlo, Pain and Art

Many reasons to love Frida Kahlo. I love her for what she taught us about pain.

Polio at age 6, leaving her right leg shorter. Terrible bus accident at 18 that left her with lifelong spinal issues. Throughout her lifetime, often bedridden, she wore tedious iron corsets to support her spine, underwent countless surgeries, eventually even an amputation, and yet she channeled her many struggles into vibrant art that broke rules, and serves to expand the human spirit even today.

Visiting Casa Azul in Mexico City in February, the house she lived in for 36 of her 47 years, I loved learning how this stunning blue-walled, plant-filled space evolved with her during her lifetime, and seeing how she filled it with animals, art, books, friends, conversations, light.

Enjoyed peeping into her notes and scribbles, observing the infinity sign, seeing how she read omnivorously, and how she used native Tehuana skirts and blouses to give grace to her disabilities. Very intentionally fashioning her own image, which wasn’t as common then as it is now. How easels and mirrors were placed above her bed so she could continue creating while convalescing.

And I very much had fun channeling her style too while in Mexico City, although I added my own twist - sturdy New Balance shoes that support my splint and my own physical challenges best.

The truth is we don’t necessarily need to paint or write or create art to be artists. We are all artists of our lives, how we love, how we move, how we create and re-create our identities, the words we choose, what we laugh at, whom we laugh with, how we pray, why we cry. And then what we do with our tears.

So, the question then is not only how to survive or even graduate from our struggles, but how to perhaps chisel pain or conflict into something bigger, perhaps also more beautiful and of value, to us, yes, but also to others and to our collective spirit.