Frida Kahlo’s artworks and personality have a big influence on material culture. Several influences shaped Kahlo’s perceptions as an artist. Kahlo’s artistic talents can be seen through her artworks which appeal to many people across the world. The renewed focus on linguistic and cultural issues in art by mainstream segments of the society has made Kahlo more popular.
She had a colorful personality which had a big impact on her artistic drive. Her works earned her a lot of recognition because they conveyed deep social imagery (Pankl and Blake 5). They talked about conscious themes of material culture and other contemporary political issues. She was heavily influenced by the Mexican revolution of the early 20th century which made her identify with revolutionary ideas (Ankori 67).
Her partnership with Diego Rivera, a Mexican artist, awakened revolutionary ideals she stood for, which later became evident in her works. Kahlo’s identity construction happened when she used her wedding photo with her husband Diego, as a source for her artworks. She also falsified her date of birth to make it look like she was born during the time of the Mexican revolution.
She had a soft spot for Jewish culture, which made her claim in her biography that her father was a Jew when in fact, he was not. Her role as a female icon in Mexico is heavily linked to revolutionary ideas which shaped the country’s destiny (Pankl and Blake 9). Her artworks draw artistic inspiration from the Mexican revolution; one of the earliest 20th-century revolutions (Conde 46).
Kahlo lived in post-revolution Mexico City and her experiences constructed her identity as a ‘material culture’ icon. The Mexican revolution brought about a strong awakening which impacted on the way artists represented various themes relevant to the country in their works. This awakening inclined heavily towards native Mexican culture as opposed to European and other Western influences.
Kahlo was able to overcome the male dominance stereotypes represented in many artworks during the Mexican renaissance by producing works which uplifted the status of women (Pankl and Blake 11). Her works leaned towards the flapper culture of the 1920s because she was well exposed to modern trends in popular culture taking place in the U.S. and Europe. She was swayed by the allure of material culture, an identity she adopted in her personality as well as her artworks.
Kahlo’s works were able to display strong feminist ideals which showed that she was an open-minded artist (Flores 14). Kahlo also identified strongly with Tehuana culture, whose women are famous historically for producing items with valuable material culture. Her husband, Diego, made her adore Tehuana culture because he portrayed her as a Tehuana woman in his murals.
Diego persuaded her to include native Mexican influences in her work. This made her appreciate various aspects of traditional Mexican material culture which she represented in her works (Pankl and Blake 17). Her iconic status in Mexico and beyond helped her to redefine the female form from an object of desire to an object of pain.
She used iconic symbols and influences from her natural environment to produce artworks which conveyed strong messages of material culture. The relevance of her works to contemporary issues has made her be regarded as an icon (Dragomir 49). Her influence goes beyond national and international borders because her artworks represent timeless ideas.
Works Cited
Ankori, Gannit. Imaging Herself: Frida Kahlo’s Poetics of Identity and Fragmentation. Westport: Greenwood Publishing, 2002. Print.
Conde, Teresa. “Frida Kahlo Once Again.” Voices of Mexico 39 (1997): 45-50. Print.
Dragomir, Adriana. “Living and Dying in The Limelight: Performing The Self in Frida Kahlo’s Diary and Paintings.” Word and Image (2009): 47-60. Print.
Flores, Tatiana. “ Strategic Modernists: Women Artists in Post- Revolutionary Mexico.” Woman’s Art Journal 29. 2 (2008): 12-22. Print.
Pankl, Lis and Kevin Blake. “Made in Her Image: Frida Kahlo as Material Culture.” Material Culture 44.2 (2012): 1-20. Print.