Frida Kahlo's 'The Two Fridas’: Great Art Explained
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"What a brilliant series this is" - Stephen Fry on Twitter 12 December 2020
"Thoroughly researched and cleverly presented, with stunning visuals, Great Art Explained makes you realise that familiarity with a work of art sometimes makes us indifferent to its power" - Forbes Magazine, 9 July 2020
I started "Great Art Explained" during lockdown. My aim is to make videos which focus on one great artwork. I want to present art in a jargon free, entertaining, clear and concise way with no gimmicks.
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Frida Kahlo is the most famous female artist in history. She deviated from the traditional portrayal of female beauty in art, and instead chose to paint raw and honest experiences. A near fatal bus accident at 18 left Frida crippled and in chronic pain her whole life, but she managed to make a virtue out of adversity, and astonishing original art out of her pain. She was a Mexican, female artist who was disabled, in a male-dominated environment in post-revolutionary Mexico. A feminist icon who broke all social conventions, and produced some of the most haunting and visionary images of the 20th century.
James Payne explains 'The Two Fridas', her greatest painting, created during a period of deep instability fro Frida Kahlo.
CREDITS
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Chinese subtitles: Charles Xue
BOOKS
Frida: The Biography of Frida Kahlo - Hayden Herrera
Frida Kahlo: I Paint my Realities - Christina Burns
MUSIC
Mexican Journey - motionarray.com/royalty-free-...
Intro music: JS Bach “Sonata for violin solo No.1 in G Minor”
The Two Fridas, qualifies as fair use under United States copyright law.
Frida Kahlo foundation
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The fact that the most famous female painter is a disabled openly bisexual Jewish-Mexican woman who became famous on her own terms and not just because she was Diego’s wife is the coolest thing to me. Her life was marred with struggles and tragedy and yet she was able to express it so beautifully and fight for her place in the spotlight in a male-dominated field. I have so much respect for her it’s unreal.
Isn’t she half German and Oaxacan?
Yus!! Been waiting for more people to recognize this incredible Ladino & Sephardi Mexican feminist activist & artist who was so far ahead of her time, that the world's apparently still not ready! People still get stuck in a loop refusing to digest Megdalena Carmen Frida Kahlo y Calderón's complex culture and life experience. Further, she fell in love with Leon Trotsky, and her most famous self-portrait was painted for him. Diego Rivera was also a Jewish-Mexican (Ladino), but a Converso. Like so many Conversos, he embraced his Jewish heritage, wanting to right the wrong of his family's forced conversion, and tried to encourage more like him to live in the open as they really are: "My Jewishness is the dominant element in my life. From this has come my sympathy with the downtrodden masses, which motivates all my work." - Diego Rivera, 1935 All of this accomplished by Jews of color in the 1930s & 1940s, in spite of Jewish persecution in Europe; they proudly stood behind their identities & their people. This, despite the massacres that plagued Mexico City's first 300 yrs, continuing the Spanish Inquisitions against Conversos believed to be practicing Judaism in secret; and the new type of Inquisition spreading throughout German colonies South America when the NSDAP came to power. They risked everything as Axis spies encroached on Mexico as one of several planned invasion points into the US, and as Stalin embedded an NKVD agent into their inner circle, who'd ultimately assassinate Trotsky.
@@Andreaagutierrez Frida's father was a Jewish-German emigrant, and mother mixed Spanish and indigenous Mexican Converso (Jews force converted to Catholicism during 400 yrs of Inquisitions). That's as far as anyone can logically define "what" Frida is by way of tracing her family's place in a world of rapidly changing borders, social upheaval, and cyclical bouts of Antisemitic persecution globally with "peace time" often few and far between, and still plagued with discrimination. Further, thought-out just the Inquisitions and Holocaust, Jewish records were plundered, destroyed, and hoarded by hostile governments that presently deny their existence as they live under lock & key. Information and personal familial records, are nothing but a weapon stowed away by primarily the modern-day British, German, Spanish, and Russian states. We're not simply talking the theft of census and immigration records, or even Synagogue membership or Converso data - but all records of human existence (i.e. birth certificates, education, residence, employment, paystubs, IDs, deeds, business registration, licenses & certifications, property & tax records, citizenship, gravestones, photographs, autobiographies, journals, writings, academic research, awards, memberships, military service, bank accounts, life insurance policies - and everything else that society uses to discern and confirm that you, in-fact, existed, and where and when you existed) being wholesale collected by state authorities stateside, in all colonies, legally/illegally annexed lands & territories; and countless "temporarily" invaded or permanently destroyed states, duchies, and kingdoms - either hidden or destroyed, on Jewish populations worldwide, virtually non-stop for nearly 2,000 years. So, when you inquire about a Jewish figure's identity, especially a beloved figure like Frida where ideology intentionally obfuscates and manipulates what little is actually known to the public as fact (meaning shared by that figure in their lifetime), and request it to be defined by state & regional borders with long bloody histories displacing indigenous people, vast eras of changing rulers colonizing the same land, and imperialization of minds by state religion & nationalism - there's only, at best (very rarely) up to 3 generations of their family's emigration records (full of misspellings & errors due to language barriers) and/or ship manifests (ships only show where & when one was finally able to obtain safe travel, and when/where they landed). These records don't capture the migrations many times over (there's never a final destination for a persecuted refugee), and today, most historic Jewish villages and ghettos worldwide have been renamed. Then, add to that the fact that Jews didn't have surnames until they were forced by the state starting in the Middle Ages. Surnames, at best, reveal a job someone held (e.g. Schwartzmann = "black man" = blacksmith), or where they lived at one point (e.g. Wolinksy = Volynskyi = Novohrad-Volynskyi, Ukraine = Zviahel, Ukraine). To define someone holding two immovable ethnicities: Jewish and part-Indigenous Mexican, by the present-day name of the state their parents fled unspeakable brutality from, is not only inaccurate; it's wholly irrelevant. It's the wrong question to ask for the jump. Borders don't define human beings. Only our roots and ethnicity, for those who have them, can inform assumptions about our ancestors. What makes an ethnic or cultural identity is actually the shared persecution experienced for generations because solely on their cultural differences - often comparatively relative to the "norms" and so-called "values" of colonizers long long ago. Persecution causes people to cling to their identity, because it's being used as justification for barbarism and injustice against Innocents, and thus the only power a powerless people can wield is to hold on to that culture as rebellion against the colonizers & rulers sending armies, or spreading pan-nationalistic ideology; to destroy. Understand that Frida was most prominent during the Holocaust. Her written communications with her father demonstrate how cryptic they had to be, for both of their safety; never getting to outright discuss their fears eating them alive, nor any memory that involved religious practice. Only frequent mentions Guillermo Kahlo's "prayers to God" for the well-being of his beloved daughter, "Frieducha," without any further religious context, can be found. Self-censorship. And for good reason... Because obviously these letters became public. The Holocaust, contrary to popular belief, wasn't restricted to Europe. Throughout South American and North African colonies of Germany, Italy, Spain, and Britain, (not to mention the massive Soviet operation under the secret German-Soviet Motolotov-Ribbentrop Pact that didn't end in 1945 and goes completely unacknowledged by mainstream historians) - the Holocaust thrived in the shadows of the largely European theater of World War II, starting as early as 1932. Why would Allied leaders draw attention to all the countries across the Mediterranean and Atlantic they didn't liberate? Or acknowledge the atrocities in all collaborationist/Axis nations intentionally misbranded as "neutral"... Or even "Allies?" "Allied" simply means "ally of Britain." Same since WWI and even earlier. Britian acted more as an Axis power until their friend "Blitzed" them for mouthing off about "we gave you Czechoslovakia, if you invade Poland we'll have to declare war... even if we don't mean it." This was also further enabled due to the simple fact that the Allies never fought against the destruction of Jews, and for most nations, it was never a primary or even secondary concern. But for the very few American leaders who did care, it was a liability to be seen as caring due to Antisemitic conspiracy theories calling FDR a "secret Jew" whose "real name" these uncreative losers speculated must be "Rosenfeld" (instead of Roosevelt, get it? Because apparently all Jews wear identifying surnames like a yellow stars of David). With the further expulsion of Middle Eastern Jews starting most aggressively in 1948, even more records and ancient villages and Synagogues have been destroyed and/or hoarded and used as bargaining chips. My family spent years doing our genealogy, and it left us with more questions than answers. European relatives showed up "disappeared" between 1941-1942, including two 1 year old infants, a 16 year old drafted into Red Army without a weapon during Barbarossa; 33 in all dead just under that one surname that's unique to only my family - only discovered when Russia handed over some more records locked-up in the Kremlin, to Israel in 2018... That took years to digitize and translate. The records tell us nothing about where they're from beyond the last ghetto or "transit camp" they were held in. All our records in the Middle East - impossible. We go based on the few family stories, languages, and ship manifests. Fleeing Europe doesn't make you European - just like the push & pull for Mexican identity between the Spaniards, indigenous Mexicans, and lesser known ethnic "tribes." Countless Mexicans are more European than Latino, but nobody calls those people out nor digs into their ancestry unless they're JEWISH. Let's not whitewash Frida for being the daughter of refugees, with one side being part indigenous to the land, not simply the state, of Mexico. There are many native ethnic groups besides just the prevailing Aztecs & Mayans.
Yes I agree ❤ she was so beyond her time
Who did she fight with in the art community?
Someone give this guy a TV show and book contract!
Ha! Thanks so much!
Couldn't agree more. These are excellent.
TV's dead. All the quality content is on youtube.
Exactly
Ay no, porfavor
"Mainly known as Diego Rivera's wife in her lifetime, it wasn't until her work was rediscovered by art historians and feminists that we now think of Diego as Frida Kahlo's husband." This got me screaming cathartically inside, "attagirl!!!!!!!!"
Same!!!
chilllllsssss!
Me too!!!!
Brilliantly put!!!
It gave me a surge of lighting energy. Such a great way to conclude.
I love her for never bowing to convention...she once went to a party in New York and all the ladies were wearing satin gowns and diamonds, and Frida walked in wearing her beautiful colorful Mexican cottons with ribbons and flowers in her hair...such a powerful woman. She was so beautiful.
Great story! Thanks 🙏
@@GreatArtExplained I think the reason why she was a gender non-comformist is because her dad wanted a son and Kahlo had 3 other sisters.
@Dennis Lee Frida was wearing a Rebozo. Mexican hand made shawl. Regards from Mexico 🇲🇽
Her outfits had a lot to do with her respect for the average working class in Mexico. She wanted to show everyone her solidarity with the workers movement, and traditional style. She was a non conformist and also a communist.
She has to be a fucking Leo rising 😂😂😂
That's a very small detail perhaps, but i love how respectful your language towards every artist is, no matter who they are
Thanks so much - I appreciate the comment 🙏
i hadn't even considered the skin tone differences in "The Two Fridas" adds such an intensity to the painting, thank you!
“May my exit be enjoyable and may I never return.” This was Frieda’s remarks before she died.
I once saw a real Frida Kahlo at the SFMOMA, it was a self portrait. It was something else, it looked like she was alive in the painting, present and she just drew you in with her gaze, it was a simple portrait but it moved me deeply cause it had so much palpable emotion, her paintings have this magnetic aura about them that draw the viewer in, once you look, you can’t stop looking 👀
How nicely you have put it!….al most as intense as the painting ítself
I love this guy ‘s voice and accent!
Thank you for that wonderful description of your experience.🌹
This is sorcery you are describing. I'm petrified, in a curious way.
you should visit her museum La Casa Azul in Mexico City if you ever get the chance!
I went to visit her house in Mexico City now a museum. It was wild. So colourful and very eclectic. Cluttered and decorative. Canary yellow walls with pictures of Mao on her bedroom wall. It was an unreal experience actually walking through the house where she lived and worked towards the end of her life.
I went to the house - amazing!
Isn’t it?
Mao? As in Mao zingdong?
@@NobleWolf33 Yup.
@@NobleWolf33I’m guessing she was a communist atheist. She didn’t believe in religion and had communist propaganda and symbols. Wonder why she would take that route? Communism is terrible.
Hi! At 3:42 he talks about her cutting her hair and a photo is shown. I just wanted people to know that that photo is actually a family photo that was taken in 1924. There is however, a very famous painting that Frida Kahlo did called Self-Portrait with Cropped Hair that was painted in 1940, a year after her divorce and that is shown at 10:27. I think this channel is doing a great job at engaging people and teaching them more about art and the history around the art world! I'm just trying to help by clearing up something that could confuse someone
I noticed that discrepancy in the vid too, but you've documented the details much better than I could... Thanx
Wait? She's the most famous female painter? 😲 Wow. Now that I think about it I can't name another famous female painter from the top of my head. I can name male painters like Picasso, Monet, Van Gogh easily but I only know about Kahlo and that's because I'm Mexican too. We definitely need more female painters.
The only ones that come to mind for me are Emily Carr, Maud Lewis and Grandma Moses. It is stunning sad how so many talented women have gone unrecognized.
check out zinaida serebriakova, she was brilliant.
Georgia 'O Keefe
@@goldmother2238 Georgia came to my mind too, I love her work.
@Twitty Fatcat - A mere sampling of women artists that I know of --- The woman who created the Bayeux Tapestry (their names may not be known, but their work certainly is), Artemisia Gentileschi, Judith Leyster, Elisabeth Vigee-Le Brun, Mary Cassatt, Yayoi Kusama. I wish there were more globally located women on my list.
I always wondered what the big deal was about Frida Kahlo. These little films really made me change my view on art. Brilliant as always James x
Thank you!
@Rachel James you sad little woman.
@Rachel James I agree. It’s ugliness for its own sake.
@@sybo59 you and your “cohort”know nothing which is why you compliment each other so…
@Rachel James you obviously need attention, this explains your tactless comment
So sad seeing how much she suffersd . Totally feel for her .. I too became disabled and now live 24 7 in bed lying completely flat. Being a retired art teacher , I'm desperate to get painting again. I'm hoping I can paint in bed , but it's so difficult with spinal problems. I'm amazed how she over come all this. What shocked me was the fact she couldnt have children. I too have the same problem , cant have children due to illness. Well it almost broke me completely... I dont know how she found the strength to paint about her life. She must have been a very strong woman at heart. I have great respect for her , and hope I can learn to be as determined as her.... ...and get back into art. What an amazing soul. What beautiful work. 💚💚💚💚💚💚💚💚
I hope she inspired you to go back to painting, even from your bed - thanks 🙏
@@GreatArtExplained Thank you for kind words 💚💚💚💚💚💚💚💚💚
stay strong and never give up on your dreams🍀
My father became a paraplegic in the sixty from an industrial accident he was 28. He also was an artist, and was bed for over a year. He painted and did drawings from his bed. keep moving forward ❤
Sending you love and praying for your recovery!
Thank you for making this video. She has been such an inspiration and her life influenced my art career. I always enjoy watching videos about her
Thanks for watching 🙏
For me not .she was arrogant and she ate human meat 🥩 and she was not folloylaw rules . She was bipolar person. People from Mexico knows the she was a bad person narcissist
🤣🤣🤣
@@hope5047 ok
@@hope5047 LMAO
I really hope we're moving towards a time when we give female artists the recognition and respect they deserve before they've died
Even male artists don’t get that so… probably not
She mastered her self portraits. Her face is so spot on, she could cut a hole in one and stand inside it and I wouldn't be able to tell the difference. Magnificent !
If you look into it some more, you will see that photographs of her and her artistic expression are quite different. She is communicating something deeper.
So compelling and entertaining. Another great episode that brings artists and their art to life - with fascinating insight and illuminating commentary. I learnt loads, as ever!
Thanks so much for the comment - glad you enjoyed it!
@@GreatArtExplained Look how many likes!
True about Frida Kahlo: kzhead.info/sun/o6qfkpF6qHlrqIU/bejne.html
I always understood there was a mystique about Frida Kahlo, but never knew anything about her life and the suffering she endured. Such a remarkable woman. Thank you for drawing us into her world.
I was in middle school when I first saw her work in a coffee table book at a friend's house. Her work brought me to tears then and it has the same effect on me now over 20 years later. What a powerful presence she must've been in person.
I was able to see this painting at the Museum of Modern Art in Mexico City, where it is currently exposed, and it is absolutely impressive. Pictures do not make any justice. It has so much texture and volume that even from the distance it looks like its coming out of the frame into life.
@Great Art Explained Went to visit La Casa Azul in Mexico, City; in Coyoacán. What an experience!! I'm Mexican, very proud to have an artist like Frida, La Bella Frida Kahlo. The museum is outstanding, impressed with such a life like her's! . Looking at her bead, the wheelchair, the mirror on the seeling at her bead is something I don't think I will ever forget. Nobody should miss a visit to see La Casa Azul in Mexico 🇲🇽 Viva México 🇲🇽 Viva Frida Kahlo.
Always thought she challenged the modern way of viewing beauty and I like it because I myself have some dark features and love my moustache but now that I understand the story behind her paintings and suffering, I m so much impressed than ever.. May she rest in peace.
Love that Corpse profile picture! :D
So much attention to detail. I took a History of Women's Art class & fell in love with the stories behind her work.
Glad you liked it - thanks for watching 🙏
You have a lovely name
I admire that she used her own pain and disability to make her art. And that she didn't allow that to stop her.
Hi! I work at La Casa Azul. I loved your video, thank you for sharing about Frida. The picture shown at 9:30 is not Frida's corset, that's a high couture dress inspired by Frida.
Was going out with my girlfriend one night and commented that her outfit reminded me of Kahlo, she excused herself and when she came back she had penciled in a monobrow and we went out like that
Queen!
Just like Vincent Van Gogh was able to take his pain and transform it into his paintings, so did Frida Kahlo.
Frida Kahlo had a way to express both her love for life and her suffering in her artwork, she displayed her strength and frailty in a way that you could some times fee it yourself. I’ve always found her paintings captivating in a bewitching way.
When I think about Frida Kahlo, I can’t help but wonder: how many other people, people with multiethnic backgrounds or non heterosexual/gender-confirming identities, artists have been lost to history? How many didn’t have Kahlo’s support system or their works were destroyed?
Way too many
I’m starting to think intersectionality is a cult.
More than one can comprehend. Further, the same happened in Science, literature, philosophy, medicine, and music. Intolerant doctrine and ideology, has stifled and held back scientific and medical advancement for generations - and countless inventions, books, and theories that define our society today were stolen from countless persecuted ethnic/cultural groups. Just the creation of Lutheranism around 1542, held back science for a low estimate of 200 years - because science disproves primarily Christian doctrine. Then see the loudest voices of the Enlightenment cut down Jewish intellectuals, banning them from teaching and criminalizing their writing for up to 20 years at a time because they continued to criticize counter-intellectual movements in science and philosophy that preached Spiritualism, aka the belief in creation of all that mankind can't figure out by the Divine and thus "faith" and "belief" can't be removed from any hypothesis or theory - branding people who exercised too much free thought as "self-centered and indulgent" - leading to an Enlightenment Inquisition of so-called "Atheists" like Spinoza accused of essentially "heresy" against philosophy itself... And by atheist, they always meant "Jewish" because most famous Enlightenment figures (many being appointed to their positions of prestige by the state, no less) realized it started to look bad outside of Europe to be so blatantly Antisemitic. The Germans, for example, get credited with all their "enginuity," but they blatantly stole inventions from Jews, kept Freud's most important unpublished work under lock and key after he fled Austria with nothing but the clothes on his back to a reluctant London in 1938 (only to die a year later), and Einstein was almost killed 4 times during his weeks long escape to the US after months and months and months of trying to secure a work visa from a non-Jewish University to get around the antisemitic Immigration Act of 1924 virtually barring all Jewish emigration just in time for the Holocaust. The Theory of Relativity, nuclear science itself, and much more, would also be credited to the Nazis, had Einstein not escaped. Just imagine how many Einsteins were systematically kidnapped and killed at Dachau, starting years before the NSDAP gained control over Germany.
Leonardo Davinci was gay and a genius.
I’d describe myself as a mediocre art aficionado at best. I do not possess the sophisticated language others use to critique art at an art gallery. And if you ask me to draw or paint something, I doodle sticks and wiggles. But when I look at a piece of art, something about it moves me. Sometimes I cry, I laugh, I cringe, I relate, I get excited, and even aroused depending on the subject matter. This is why I go to art galleries, for my own pleasure by letting art speak to my emotions in ways I cannot explain. So thank you to the maker of these videos for you, sr., just add an extra layer of appreciation to my truly humble understanding of art. Thank you sr.!
The movie _Frida_ is extraordinary. It is beautifully photographed, and the music is exquisite.
@@pattyayers ..who has to ask? The comment section is open for a reason.
@@pattyayers I know you’re a troll but you’re probably also the kind of person that would look at a Pollock or Rothko and say “I could have done that”. 🤣
Yes agreed that song Paloma Negra is so incredibly powerful in the scene where she’s drinking and cutting her hair raging over Rivera’s constant infidelities.
Selma hyek went through so much to get that movie produced- Weinstein was being his disgusting self to her so essentially she had to overcome the male Hollywood dominance but in the end it was worth it.
Y faltaron miles de estampas, más crueles que ninguna película de Cleopatra
Love this artist..the honesty smacks you in the face 😯
This man should have a Netflix show man it’s so good
Chris Martin told Rolling Stone that he named Coldplay's album and song " Viva la vida" after he saw the phrase on a painting by Frida Kahlo. Amazing video! I learned a lot about Frida. x
I think She was very beautiful.. And I connect with her on so many levels I'm also Disabled and express My emotions through Art and Writing
The leather corsets said to be used by Frida were not hers nor used by her. They were art pieces designed by Jean Paul Gaultier for the opening of the “Appearances Can Be Deceiving” exhibit at La Casa Azul in Coyoacán, México City.
Thankyou for sharing this. I watched it whilst soaking in the tub at 3:06 a.m.. My right leg was injured in a accident with my horses when they got spooked in their stall, knocked me down and trampled me until I finally pulled myself up by grabbing onto one of their long tails. That was 15 years ago. Sometimes at night my right hip and leg are on FIRE with pain even with all the meds I take sometimes nothing else works but getting into the tub and soaking for several hours. Frida has been an inspiration to me for decades but after my accident I really began to relate to the constant pain that can either KILL your very SOUL or you can use the pain and the visions that come from the undying pain that you can Express your feelings on canvas and with your writing. Thankyou again for sharing this information about Frida with us. Peace. ✌❤🇨🇦🐈
Oh my gosh, what a story! Glad that frida is an inspiration. Thanks 🙏
@@GreatArtExplained Wow, you actually replied! Thankyou. Yes it was a crazy experience. But sometimes it takes those dramatic changes along your path that Really open your eyes. Freda has always had a place in my heart long before my trampling. . After the accident, I have been laid up. So I started to appreciate painting my pain gave me relief. I finally got that she too must have got great relief in focusing on painting where the Pain and constant Torture lived in her body. Stupidly I showed my paintings to one of my Doctors. In the painting I had removed my right leg and it was hanging behind me in my room, while I am finally able to relax on my bed in the foreground. I was showed him the painting so he could see what techniques was finding useful in dealing with the debilitating constant raw pain late at night. Let's say he wasn't a fan, and he has never had another appointment with me again. Bwahahah! I thought it was positive that the painting of my pain was actually helping me. It focused me so much on the details of where the pain lives inside me that it oddly helped me deal with it. Clearly he didn't see it as a good thing. Bwahahah. I have suggested trying to paint to pain to others who have chronic pain as a way of dealing with it. Sadly Most people just prefer to Zone out on the heavy meds they give you to try and cope. These Heavy meds only move the pain to another room in the house that is my body. They don't ever really get rid of the pain though. Again thanks for sharing this video. It really helped me tonight! Peace 🙏 🇨🇦🐈
May G-d bless you with a whole healing. REFUAH SHLEYMA...
@@asherkrupnik Thank you!💞💗🕯🙏
After three or four of these videos I feel so cultured, like I could walz right into the Louvre and become a tour guide
😂🤣😂🤣
Yay we at least got one for the world history to remember us! 🇲🇽🇲🇽
🇲🇽
We have a lot more than one lol
She exudes authority as the subject in her paintings
Frida has inspired me & given me a roadmap to my Self. I recommend her journal, which is a fantastic journey inward.
Thanks!
Such a great mini-documentary film. And I love how she is now so much more famous than Diego Rivera. Brilliant as always, James. (Andrea)
Thanks so much! I loved making this one!
The muralism of Diego is much more better and interesting than the selfish Frida's paintings
@@rpb3348 yes it is from a technical standpoint. But Frida is transcendental my friend, you may not like her paintings the same way you don't like suffering. Her art is tragic, and awfully truthful.
@@rpb3348 his muralism was much better than her work over all we gotta leave gender out of it. This chick is just an over zealous feminist
@@latuya5887 "We gotta leave gender out of it" in the fist sentence. "This chick" in the second. Is this attentional irony?
I love the spirit of Frieda eventhough she was a sufferer. I have an art book of all her work-- right down to scrap paper drawing and water colorings. I cherish this book. It has made many a subject of conversations sitting on my cocktail table.
thank you for also talking about her disability in this film! i sometimes forget that not only was she a woman and POC, she also talked about her disability in her own art.
This entire series is phenomenal. Usually I don't comment on videos, but, your videos really hit on another level. Personally, I'm rather new to art and understanding the components and what makes art that many consider good, well, good. But your videos are able to make me understand why those pieces are good and all the other underlying features, and it also makes me want to learn more about these artists and their other works. I'm really enjoying art more because of your videos. Thanks so much, and keep on being amazing.
Thanks 🙏 Greg - much appreciated!
This is an erudite and revealing take on one of the great iconic female painters of the 20th century -Payne goes straight to the heart of Frieds Kahlo's identity and how she turned her misfortune around to hold up a mirror to us of her pain but always revealing the beauty and the sense of ritual and tradition
Thank you for your comment!
I didn’t buy the duality of her identity. Most Mexicans are Mestizos, of European and Indigenous heritage, so she would have been comfortable in a nation of hybrid ethnicity.
The painting of the deer with arrows in it tells volumes. All paintings shown here I have seen in person. The key is to understand that these masterpieces are for contemplation.
Her life is so tragic. Like Van Gogh she never got to see how much the world loved her work.
These videos are the reason I’m passing my art class
That’s what I like to hear! 🙏
These videos make KZhead worthwhile , superb and so well delivered .
That’s a really nice thing to say - thank you!
I can’t believe I found your channel! I used to not understand art and would simply skip over anything related to it such as art classes in high school. I’m binge watching your channel because you explain things in such an easy manner and give me the context I need to understand! Thank you so much! You have no idea the great help that you’ve given me ❤️ Also, I’m now starting to think about visiting art museums. :) Thank you
I love art museums. I hope you will visit some. There are tons of great art documentaries and artist bios on KZhead. Some are short like this one others are longer but they are entertaining and informative. You don't have to know anything about the artist or the history to enjoy art - but I find it enriches the experience. I'm glad you've found inspiration here.
I love Frida and her work tremendously. When i look at her paintings, i feel and understand and even relate to her pain. 💔💔💔💔💔💔
I see her pain too …
I had the privilege of seeing the 'Making Herself Up' exhibition at the V&A in 2018. It was so stunning, so inspiring. She coped with so much pain and heartache. From her smallest retablos to a massive display of her dresses, it really showed the character of Frida. Her prosthetic legs and shoes were decorated in the same vibrant colours of her clothing. I stood in front of her 'Self Portrait on the Border of Mexico and the United States of America' for what seemed like hours. Thank you for this insight into the artist, I truly enjoyed it.
Really interesting - loved the analysis of the painting "The Two Fridas".
Thanks so much - and thanks for watching!
She spoke to me through her art. I appreciate her coming to me.
Loved this. Please do more female artists! Helen Frankenthaler namely, she was a pioneer in technique and form and is often overlooked.
Such a strong and talented woman with a tragic destiny. When I think about all her sufferings, I’m horrified. Thank you for this episode.
My family started in San Luis Potosí. Our family stems Austria, Belgium, Spain and Mexico (Mayan). Artists, Musicians, Doctors and Engineers abound in my family tree! BUT Artistic Talent is everywhere! Your coverage of her is awe inspiring!
My attitude towards art is changing because of content like this. Can’t wait to see your upcoming videos.
Please leave a comment (even a short one) and "like" the video. It really helps promote the channel on KZhead. I appreciate it! James
I can't say I ever cared for her work but your narration and history lesson gives insight I wouldn't have had. Thank you!
This tells me more than I ever knew about Frida Kahlo.
YOUR WORK IS GENIUS AND SHOULD BE RECOGNIZED. These videos are enlightening as well as inspiring and should be included in the regular coursework of students. Does anyone else agree?
I was fortunate to see this in person at a special exhibit in the SFMOMA many years ago. It blew me away. So rich in symbolism.
Wow love the commentary! The last line ends with "seeing" Diego as Frida Kahlo's husband ended the video perfectly 👍
She’s a favorite of mine as a painter, myself, and a long-time art history student. Your video included info I had not known about FK. Thank you so much for this.
I can't begin to explain how much I love this woman. When I think of her and her art I feel such a warmth and joy In my heart. She inspires me on my everyday life.
I’m just discovering this amazing channel! As an Art History and Religious Studies graduate, I would say that Frida Khalo will always be the most important influence on my life in terms of inspiring the direction of my career and studies. When I first discovered Frida’s art, I was 5 years old and ever since it’s felt as if my entire being had been infiltrated by her essence…it’s an inexplicable connection that I’ve never questioned, though it’s remained a haunting aspect of my life. I nearly cry every time I see anything about her…she was so beautiful, free, vibrant, yet so deeply wounded and fragile. I love her as if she were my family. Thank you so much for this amazing piece!
This is such a great documentary. Thank you so much for the information.
Oh wow man, you're amazing! I've never been a huge fan of art history, but your explanation and interpretation of these great paintings are so intriguing that I watched for hours nonstop. I learned so much and am definitely gonna keep watching your other videos. By the way, your ending sentence is very touching. Love it. Keep up the great work!
Omg… you made me cry with that last line. Fantastic!
Very well explained. Thank you. I love 'The Two Fridas' ❤️
I love Frida. Thank you for teaching me more about her! I appreciate the respect and reserve you have here for her.
Today her art was auctioned in ny for 34 million making her the highest auction bid for any Latin American artist man or woman
Yes Frida is an avatar and an example for us especially those who suffer. How to fight creatively. I was asked and have been doing presentations "Frida Collaged and Me Too" for many years.
Thank you ever so much for all you do to spread art among the hoi polloi, the interested, the dilettante and so many more... 😊
Very interesting. This lady was courageous, talented, bold.
Thanks for watching 🙏
Frida and Diego are my favorites. Your channel is outstanding.
I've been seeing her paintings for many years didn'y know who she was. I love her work and story
I was looking for 15-20 min art videos. And I've found them. Thankfully to you now I realise that I want 1,5 hour long videos! Huge thank you for your work 🧡
13:36 hi, I did the conversion + inflation. The National Institute of Fine Arts in Mexico paid Frida $11,877 in today's USD for her painting. disclaimer, im not a math person
These videos are so illuminating and so relaxing. They give you so much to consider and think about while lowering your blood pressure! HA!
I can't tell you how much we enjoy your videos. They are insightful, entertaining and thought provoking. So often people who produce videos like these pontificate or go off on tangents that are more about themselves than the artists or the work. We appreciate that your videos are nothing like that. Your focus on the art and artist is very refreshing. There were two points you made that we found particularly interesting...when you said that she may not have been a great technical painter, but that the Two Fridas was a great painting. We wholeheartedly agree. The other was when you mentioned that the background echoes the style of El Greco. Another fantastic video. We very much look forward to your next installment.
Thanks so much for your comments. I’m really enjoying making them and Frida Kahlo was such an interesting artist.
Bravo!
In 15 min you managed to tell so much more than any book or movie I have ever watched or read. Wonderful channel. I studied art 11 years ago. I wish this channel existed back then.
Thank You, Thank You, Thank You! You are an Inspiration of humble excellence. Thank you for your work!
Another brilliant commentary. I must confess I knew nothing of this until now. I'd never particularly been a fan of Frida's work; but now I will be able to appreciate, and enjoy it, on a whole new level.
Thanks so much - I’m glad you liked it!
This was beautiful. Frida is one of my favourite artists of all time. Very well detailed and great presentation. Keep up the good work!
Thank you and Thanks for watching 🙏
I just happened to find your channel and I’m so glad I did, I love learning about the history of artists and their work, Frida is one of my favorites! I also enjoy your interpretations, thank you for your content!
My Mexican female friends all revere Frida, and rightly so. It’s awesome to see a strong woman overcome so many obstacles to become an artistic and cultural icon. Bravo, Frida. Bravo!
A remarkable woman and an artist - quite the force of nature! ❤️
this is EASILY one of the best channels on youtube! i thank you for your work, and anyone else involved in bringing this amazing content to us.
Thank you for your quality content!
Farida was not only a painter, but she was an author whose words resonated like magic. She was an emotional and sensitive person who drew words. ❤❤ If there is a reason I love Mexico, it is Frida Kahlo❤️
This channel is golden and sincere. What a treasure to the world!
Thank you for making this video. Frida Kahlo is one of my favourite artists, warts and all.
Thanks for watching (and for commenting)! 🙏
Great Channel! Its actually something i've been looking for a long time! Thank you for your wonderful work!
Ahh Frida! 😍 I was 6 yo when Frida Khalo 2002 biopic came out. I have been utterly in love with her ever since
Woman, rebel, marxist, disabled, feminist, fashion icon. Goddess.
Feminist? Mmm I don't know. Her behavoiur about Diego Rivera si not about a real feminist.
@@blackcrow2521 it was a toxic relationship but she was the victim
@@blackcrow2521 in many ways she was a feminist.she was pretty much the only female painter in her circles. was involved with communist sympathizers, which was a male dominated area. the facial hair.
If my teacher thought art history like you I would remember it all
Not an art lover, artist, art collector, art connoisseur, etc. Idk why this was recommended to me. But I've seen her picture and it never occurred to me that she's a real human who of course draws herself. Amazing! 👏