MEXICO: Dresses and other items belonging to Mexican painter Frida Kahlo to go on display in Mexico City this November

Record ID: 305676

  • Title: MEXICO: Dresses and other items belonging to Mexican painter Frida Kahlo to go on display in Mexico City this November
  • Date: 28th September 2012
  • Summary: VARIOUS OF PHOTOGRAPHS OF FRIDA KAHLO
  • Embargoed: 13th October 2012 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Mexico
  • Country: Mexico
  • Topics: Arts
  • Reuters ID: LVAB138G4LPT77H58DCZI2IRQG5N
  • Story Text: Hundreds of dresses and other possessions belonging to famed Mexican painter Frida Kahlo will go on display in Mexico City in November after decades under lock and key.
    The items, which include dresses, shirts, corsets, bathing suits and photographs were uncovered in 2004 when museum officials entered previously unopened rooms and closets in Kahlo's "Blue House" in the Mexico City neighbourhood of Coyoacan.
    Kahlo was well known for her style of dress, often using textiles and styles representative of Mexico's different regions and indigenous cultures. The exhibit seeks to explore themes of ethnicity and disability through Kahlo's possessions.
    "We must remember that Frida - like Diego - wanted the colours, the dress, the culture of Mexican women to be public and known. Above all, during the time period in which they did so, the 1920's and 1930's. That was the end of the Revolution. They were attempting to rescue a people which had been abandoned. Mexican society dressed like Europeans. Those types of clothes weren't appreciated as much anymore," explained Carlos Phillips, the Director General of a network of three museums which exhibit Kahlo and Diego Rivera's work.
    The rooms had been previously been left closed at the request of world renowned Mexican muralist Diego Rivera, who was twice married to Kahlo despite being nearly 20 years her senior.
    Kelly Talamas, the editor of Vogue magazine for Mexico and Latin America, said that Kahlo's wardrobe was a representation of her various personality traits and life.
    "Frida Kahlo without a doubt is a very important icon in the fashion scene. There are so many collections that we've included in the magazine throughout the years, that have been inspired by her as person. She has different aspects to her personality. Based on everything that she experienced in her life, she had different aspects. She had more of a dark side, and also had her side in which she was inspired by the colours and the textures and the people and the culture here in Mexico. You can see that in her wardrobe. I think that's what's most inspiring to designers, that the pieces that she wore create a story. They tell a story about who she was as a person and about what she believed in, about what she was feeling inside," she said.
    Kahlo began painting as a teenager while convalescing from a horrific tram crash in 1925 in which she broke her back in three places and fractured other bones.
    The accident and a legacy of childhood polio left her in constant physical pain and unable to have children. That suffering is often depicted in her work, which dwells on themes of pain and female disfigurement.
    Circe Henestrosa, the exhibit's curator, said that Kahlo's dresses were also a way for Kahlo to hide her physical imperfections, as well as promote Mexican culture.
    "She didn't just choose any dress. This particular dress came from the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, where women run society, and basically administer all money matters. It symbolizes a strong woman. It's also a dress that projected her political beliefs and her desire to promote her Mexican identity. As far as her disability, it's a dress that allowed her to hide her physical imperfections," she said.
    The museum will display 22 items of clothing at a time, and rotate them after five months.
    "Today we are seeing the revival of popular art, the influences of pre-Hispanic art, and how this is projected at a global level. Frida Kahlo is a very important example of this. All of Frida's efforts to revive this art through her wardrobe and build a personality today influence international fashion," said Hilda Trujillo, the Director of the Frida Kahlo Museum in the Blue House.
    Kahlo died in July 1954 after suffering a bout of pneumonia. Her feminism, lifestyle and Communist political beliefs have made her an iconic figure world-wide.
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