Frida Kahlo
“In the [above picture] Frida Kahlo makes clear her ambivalent feelings towards “Gringolandia”. In an elegant pink dress and with a Mexican flag in her hand, she stands like a statue on a pedestal between two different worlds – on the one side, the ancient Mexican landscape, governed by the forces of nature and the natural life cycle, and on the other the dead, technology-dominated landscape of the United States”
My Dress Hangs There was painted in 1933 and “represents an ironic portrait of American capitalism. Filled with symbols of modern American industrial society, it points to social decay and the destruction of fundamental human values. Frida Kahlo thereby takes an opposite view to her husband, who was currently expressing approval of industrial progress in a mural in the Rockefeller Center.”
“On 4 July 1933, Frida Kahlo suffered a miscarriage in Detroit. The small, vulnerable figure of the artist lying in an enormous bed in front of a vast plain creates an impression of loneliness and helplessness – a reflection of her feelings following the loss of her baby and during her stay at the hospital. The impression of forlornness is reinforced by the desolate industrial landscape on the horizon, against which the bed appears to float.”
You can learn more about the life of Frida Kahlo here:
Quotes are taken from the biography Kahlo by Andrea Kettenmann (2006)
Written by Meelina Galope