Frida - Beyond the Myth

This is a real cultural event for Italy. Such a complete exhibition has never been in Italy, and even in the world for 15 years, the entire collection of the Dolores Olmedo Museum (Mexico) and Jacques and Natasha Gelman Collection - the two most important museums with Frida Kahlo art. Also, there are collections from several other museums, which also has never been in Italy.

This exhibition was collected after six years of careful research of Frida Kahlo archives. Previously unpublished amazing archive materials give a new interpretation of the Frida figure, and it tries to avoid forced reconstructions, standard interpretations or a banal snap to her biography.

Such a full exhibition of Frida Kahlo art has never been in Italy, photo © mudec.it

Her biography is known to many people - it was full of pain and suffering. At the age of 6, she got ill with poliomyelitis, as a result one leg remained partially paralyzed. The girl began to limp from childhood.

At the age of 17 she fell into a terrible accident, received fractures of the spine, multiple fractures of the whole body - she was restored in two years, and it was miracle that she survived. There was everything in her life: pain, despair, overcoming difficulties, love, passion, betrayal and later recognition.

There was a lot of pain and suffering In the biography of Frida, photo © mudec.it

About her life with Diego Rivera and meetings with Leon Trotsky was written a lot. There were films and songs dedicated to her. Her life became a legend, a myth. Therefore this exhibition tries to look into the world of Frida, hidden beyond the myth.

Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera, photo © mudec.it

The main thing is that you can go to the exhibition without knowing who Frida Kahlo is. There are a lot of photographs, letters, materials about her life, and of course her drawings and paintings. The exposition consists of four large parts: "Woman", "Earth", "Politics" and "Pain".

Frida Kahlo paintings, photo © mudec.it

Frida Kahlo was the first female artist who made manifesto from her own body. She expresses her femininity in a direct, explicit, and sometimes cruel manner, revolutionizing the role of women in the history of art.

Frida Kahlo focuses on her condition and her own body, which becomes a key, a sign and a gesture in many of her works. With the help of it, the myths of traditions, gender identity and femininity, dissolved in the public sphere, are collapsing.

The exposition consists of four large parts, photo © mudec.it

Frida Kahlo's body, thrown under the merciless view of the public, is a sacrificial and political act. Her self-portraits and paintings become a poetic sign aimed at emphasizing the frailty, suffering and strong emotions of the human race.

Her self-portraits become a poetic sign, photo © mudec.it

As the curator of the exhibition Diego Sileo explains, "Frida Kahlo's body is in itself a writing, a system of signs that represent a person's search, his fears, his anxieties, his unconscious desires, his relationship with time." The characteristic "body language" is thus described in a series of works, for example, in "Broken Column" or "Henry Ford Hospital", in which Frida Kahlo tries to touch the deep feelings of a person through anatomical display of suffering and deprivation.

"Broken Column" (left) and "Henry Ford Hospital" (right), photo © mudec.it

Despite the piercing pain, there are a lot of bright moments at the exhibition, for example, a video with Frida and her husband Diego Rivera, whom she wrote in her "Diary": 

"Diego is the principle

Diego is a builder

Diego is my child

Diego is my boyfriend

Diego is an artist

Diego is my lover

Diego is my husband

Diego is my friend

Diego is my mother

Diego is my father

Diego is my son

Diego is me

Diego is the universe »

"My life is a serious story. My work is like a conductor of pain", Fried wrote in the same "Diary". And this exhibition, dedicated to it - is a very serious story, which is worth to outlive.

Evgeny Utkin, Milan, Italy

INFORMATION

The exhibition is open to visitors from February 1, 2017 to June 3, 2018 in the Mudec Museum of Cultures

Address: Milan, st. Tortona, 56

Website: www.mudec.it

Here can be your advertising!