In conversation with Kahlo’s feminine attributes with which she often depicted herself—such as traditional embroidered Tehuana dresses or flowers in her hair—and instead sports a loose-fitting man’s suit and short-clipped haircut. Her high-heeled shoes and one dangling earring remain, however, along with her characteristic penetrating outward gaze. Locks of hair are strewn across the floor, a severed braid lies next to her chair, and the artist holds a pair of scissors across her lap. This androgynous persona may refer to Kahlo’s own bisexuality, while the lyrics of a popular Mexican song that appear at top suggest the address of a lover: “Look, if I loved you it was because of your hair. Now that you are without hair, I don’t love you anymore.”
Personal isolation—its pain and its strength—is a recurring force across the sixty self-portraits Kahlo painted in her career and for which she became celebrated. “I paint self-portraits because I am so often alone,” Kahlo once explained, “because I am the person I know best.”
7.25w x 9"h
48pp, published by MoMA
August 2019
In conversation with Kahlo’s feminine attributes with which she often depicted herself—such as traditional embroidered Tehuana dresses or flowers in her hair—and instead sports a loose-fitting man’s suit and short-clipped haircut. Her high-heeled shoes and one dangling earring remain, however, along with her characteristic penetrating outward gaze. Locks of hair are strewn across the floor, a severed braid lies next to her chair, and the artist holds a pair of scissors across her lap. This androgynous persona may refer to Kahlo’s own bisexuality, while the lyrics of a popular Mexican song that appear at top suggest the address of a lover: “Look, if I loved you it was because of your hair. Now that you are without hair, I don’t love you anymore.”
Personal isolation—its pain and its strength—is a recurring force across the sixty self-portraits Kahlo painted in her career and for which she became celebrated. “I paint self-portraits because I am so often alone,” Kahlo once explained, “because I am the person I know best.”
7.25w x 9"h
48pp, published by MoMA
August 2019
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