Biography

Frida Kahlo was born on July 6, 1907 in Coyocoan, Mexico City, Mexico. She grew up in the family's home where was later referred to as the Blue House or Casa Azul. At age six, Kahlo contracted polio, which permanently damaged her right foot and leg. She attended the renowned National Preparatory School in Mexico City in the year of 1922. There are only thirty-five female students enrolled in that school and she soon became famous for her outspokenness and bravery. After a bus accident left Kahlo seriously injured, she began painting and finished her first self-portrait in 1926. 

In 1929, Kahlo married fellow Mexican artist Diego Rivera, and the pair spent the early 1930s traveling in Mexico and the United States together. She had her first solo gallery exhibition in New York City in 1938, an another in Paris in 1939, where the Louvre purchased a painting making Kahlo the first Mexican artist to be featured in their collection. Throughout the 1940s, Kahlo continued to participate in exhibitions in Mexico and the United States. She also began to teach at the Escuela Nacional de Pintura, Escultura y Grabado “La Esmeralda”, and became a founding member of the Seminario de Cultura Mexicana. She had her first solo exhibition in Mexico in 1953. Frida Kahlo died on July 13, 1954, at age 47. 

Frida Kahlo's fame has been growing after her death. Her Blue House was opened as a museum in the year of 1958. In the 1970s the interest in her work and life is renewed due to the feminist movement since she was viewed as an icon of female creativity.

Frida Kahlo Biography. https://www.fridakahlo.org/frida-kahlo-biography.jsp. Accessed 7 Mar. 2024.