Frida Kahlo

de Frida Kahlo, Pablo Ortiz Monasterio

When Frida Kahlo died in 1954, her husband Diego Rivera asked the poet CarlosPellicer to turn her family home, the fabled Blue House, into a museum. Pellicer selected somepaintings, drawings, photographs, books and ceramics, maintaining the space just as Kahlo andRivera had arranged it to live and work in. The rest of the objects, clothing, documents,drawings and letters, as well as over 6,000 photographs collected by Kahlo over the course ofher life, were put away in bathrooms that had been converted into storerooms. This incredibletrove remained hidden for more than half a century, until, just a few years ago, these storeroomsand wardrobes were opened up. Kahlo's photograph collection was a major revelation amongthese finds, a testimony to the tastes and interests of the famous couple, not only through theimages themselves but also through the telling annotations inscribed upon them. Photography hadalways been a part of Kahlo's life -her father Guillermo Kahlo was one of the great Mexicanphotographers at the beginning of the twentieth century- and her collection constitutes a roll callof great photographers: Man Ray, Brassaï, Martin Munkacsi, Pierre Verger, GeorgeHurrel, Tina Modotti, Edward Weston, Manuel and Lola Álvarez Bravo, GisèleFreund and many others, including Kahlo herself. It is likely that many of the unattributedphotographs in the collection were taken by her, though we can only be sure of the few that shedecided to sign in 1929. Frida Kahlo: Her Photos allows us to speculate about Kahlo's andRivera's likes and dislikes, and to document their family origins; it supplies a thrilling andhugely significant addition to our knowledge of Kahlo's life and work.