Product Description

Frida Kahlo, the writer? In this new expanded edition of the painter's writings, art critic Raquel Tibol gathers letters, poems, notes, protests, confessions, brief messages and longer texts written by Kahlo to her friends, her lovers and others. In her writings, Kahlo employs, in Tibol's words, an "unreserved, imaginative language, heart and intimacy laid bare," that reveals her taste for neologisms, colloquial turns and the crossing of linguistic boundaries. The freedom of her language is a path towards sincerity, the origin of Kahlo's pictorial universe, with its recurring motifs: the tramway accident that left the artist physically maimed at the age of 18; her anguished and demanding adolescent passion for Alejandro Gomez Arias; her complex and fascinating relationship with Diego Rivera; her illness as destiny; her political engagements; and her uncompromising quest for liberty. Here the reader will find Kahlo "swinging back and forth between sincerity and manipulation, self-complacency and self-flagellation, with her insatiable need for affection, her erotic upheavals, her touches of humor, setting no limits for herself, with a capacity for self-analysis and a deep humility." By gathering this material, until now scattered in archives and various published sources, Tibol offers us "a tacit autobiography and the placement of Frida within the intimate, confessional literature of the twentieth century in Mexico." This is a Frida Kahlo far removed from the distorted image so often found in films, plays and supposedly serious writings and studies--a beautiful book about Frida, by Frida.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #115549 in Books
• Published on: 2007-06-01
• Released on: 2007-06-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 400 pages

Customer Reviews

Wonderful book
I absolutely adore this work. I own all literature on Frida Khalo and this book is my favorite. For Frida Khalo fans , this book is an absolute must have in your collection

Just Frida
Letters are windows into the soul. Frida needed to love and of course to be loved. Her letters are tender and we see her need for love. Strong yet she must have lost confidence in her womanly powers from the accident and her ealier polio . Am I desirable? This I am sure she worried over. Diego's lust for other women must have caused Frida much pain as well. She writes often of what she will do to please others. Is it any wonder.

Must have
This is a must-have book for all Frida fans. I only wish that the letters of the people she was writing to had also been retrieved and included in the book.