ARTAND SOUL OF MEXICO
Let Frida Kahlo introduce you to this captivatingly complex country ...
When the Mexican artist Fr ida K ah lo put paintbrush to canvas, the results were striking. But when she turned herself into a work of art, sporting flamboyant national costumes, jangling jewellery and her trademark monobrow, she became a sensation.
With her championing of indigenous culture, Kahlo became the poster girl of modern Mexico. Yet poster girl doesn’t quite explain her fame. As the wife of the famous Mexican muralist Diego Rivera, she was already well-known in her lifetime. But since her death in 1954, her reputation has far eclipsed his.
A polio victim who suffered a terrible traffic accident at the age of 18, she was plagued by ill health, eventually losing a leg to gangrene. ‘At the end of the day, we can endure much more than we think we can,’ she once said.
Translating her own experiences of pain and infertility into art helped to make her one of the most compelling painters of the 20th century.
An exhibition, Frida Kahlo: Making her Self Up, which opened last week at London’s Victoria & Albert Museum, examines her legacy.
On show are 200 personal effects that have never left Mexico before, including her jewel- coloured costumes, chunky jewellery and, most poignantly, her prosthetic leg. Plus, the eyebrow pencil used to enhance that unibrow.
As Claire Wilcox, co- curator of the show, points out, her mixed heritage ( european and Mexican) and her defiance of social conventions make her increasingly relevant to today’s society: ‘She achieved an individualism that has survived, that’s alluring.’ Gender-fluidity? Cross- dressing? Frida got there first.
In Mexico City, she adorns banknotes, cushions and shopping bags. Yet in the calm of her former home, the Blue house in Coyoacan, a quiet suburb, the souvenir tat is soon forgotten. Despite attracting more than 25,000 tourists a month, the museum remains a tranquil place in shades of cobalt and terracotta.
Visiting is like stepping into a vivid paintbox. It was here that she lived, worked and loved in equal measure: her lovers including the exiled Russian communist, Leon Trotsky.
With her husband, she was part of a political and cultural renaissance that attracted artists from all over the world to Mexico, many from war-torn europe. Seduced by the bohemian lifestyle and the landscape of volcanoes and pyramids, these artists soon established colonies, making the country a powerhouse of the avant-garde.
With those communities in mind, I flew north some 170 miles from Mexico City to San Miguel de Allende, where Rivera worked for a time. It’s an elegant colonial city that grew rich from the silver trade. Arriving at dusk, we walked through the streets of 16th and 17th-century mansions to the main square, Plaza Allende, where men were playing chess and sipping beer.
Listed as a World heritage Site by UneSCO in 2008, the architecture of the old town remains unchanged since the Spanish ruled. But today it’s art, not silver, that has brought this town wealth. With two leading art schools, foreign students have been arriving since the Thirties.
MAnY settled and today an estimated 20,000 expats live here, mostly U.S. and Canadian citizens, making up a third of the population. ‘It’s only ten hours’ drive from the border, so it’s our equivalent of Tuscany’, one American woman told me.
We based ourselves at the newly refurbished Belmond Casa Sierra de nevada, a cluster of old town houses (casonas). Arts and crafts are centre-stage here: each room features original artworks and textiles woven by artisans. Guests are encouraged to try their hand in an art class given by the hotel’s resident artist.
One evening we climb up to the roof terrace to watch the sunset over the town. Beneath us the mauve of the jacaranda trees darkens to amethyst, the pantiled roofs gleam gold and the sky turns ultramarine.
These were Frida’s colours. now it’s our turn to stop in our tracks and look in wonder.
TRAVEL FACTS
COX & Kings ( coxandkings.
co.uk) offers an eight-day/ five-night private trip to Mexico from £1,795pp, including two nights’ B&B at the Galeria Plaza Reforma in Mexico City, three nights’ B&B at the Belmond Casa Sierra Nevada, overnight flights with AeroMexico, airport transfers and travel between Mexico City and San Miguel de Allende. Frida Kahlo: Making Her Self Up is on at the V&A until November 4 ( vam.ac.uk).