Redesigning Reality With Frida Kahlo and Vincent Van Gogh
Artists paint and create images as a form of communication. A concept which most artists find hard to paint is their inner thought and feelings. As they must explore deep into their sub-conscious to find who they truly are as a person and how they can represent that on a canvas, print or paper through the use of symbols and other techniques. Two artists who have done this are Frida Kahlo and Vincent Van Gogh.
Frida Kahlo was one of the most important Mexican artists of her time. She is well known for her harsh revealing self-portraits. She started to paint at the age of 15 after she was in a horrific bus accident, where she then began her career as an artist. These self-portraits, mainly reflected her physical and emotional suffering she has gone through since the accident and later on in her life. Along with this she was greatly influenced by her husband also a great painter at the time, Diego Rivera, and Mexican folk art. 'Her work is colourful, almost naive vigour, tinged with surrealist fantasy ' (A Dictionary of Twentieth Century Art, 1998: Online)
Henry Ford Hospital 1932
Oil Painting
One of Frida Kahlo 's most famous pieces titled 'Henry Ford Hospital '. It 's based on a real life incident that happened to Frida while she pregnant and asleep in her New York apartment. Frida uses a lot of symbols in this picture to represent different evens in her life. This painting is was done a 12 x 15 inch canvas, using oil paints.
It features herself, Frida, lying on a bed naked with lots of blood around her groin. Her hands are holding her stomach as she loses her baby in this tragic scene. The red lines represent the umbilical cord of her baby. They are attached to six objects in the painting: her baby(centre), wilted flowers (below the bed) , doctors operating instruments(bottom left) , pelvic bone(bottom right), a model of a woman 's womb (top left), a snail(top right). Each of these objects represented something important in Frida 's life. Her unborn fetus -
Frida Kahlo was one of the most important Mexican artists of her time. She is well known for her harsh revealing self-portraits. She started to paint at the age of 15 after she was in a horrific bus accident, where she then began her career as an artist. These self-portraits, mainly reflected her physical and emotional suffering she has gone through since the accident and later on in her life. Along with this she was greatly influenced by her husband also a great painter at the time, Diego Rivera, and Mexican folk art. 'Her work is colourful, almost naive vigour, tinged with surrealist fantasy ' (A Dictionary of Twentieth Century Art, 1998: Online)
Henry Ford Hospital 1932
Oil Painting
One of Frida Kahlo 's most famous pieces titled 'Henry Ford Hospital '. It 's based on a real life incident that happened to Frida while she pregnant and asleep in her New York apartment. Frida uses a lot of symbols in this picture to represent different evens in her life. This painting is was done a 12 x 15 inch canvas, using oil paints.
It features herself, Frida, lying on a bed naked with lots of blood around her groin. Her hands are holding her stomach as she loses her baby in this tragic scene. The red lines represent the umbilical cord of her baby. They are attached to six objects in the painting: her baby(centre), wilted flowers (below the bed) , doctors operating instruments(bottom left) , pelvic bone(bottom right), a model of a woman 's womb (top left), a snail(top right). Each of these objects represented something important in Frida 's life. Her unborn fetus -
Bibliography: [CD-ROM] World Book Encyclopaedia 2001 Deluxe [Online] Unknown. Frida Kahlo. [Online] http://www.artchive.com/artchive/K/kahlo.html , 23-7-06 Unknown. Frida Kahlo - Wikipedia the free encyclopaedia. [Online] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frida_Kahlo , 23-7-06 Unknown. Vincent Van Gogh 's Bedroom - Arles - Provence. [Online] http://www.avignon-et-provence.com/musees/chambre-vincent/gb/index.html , 26-7-06 Unknown. WebMuseum: Gogh, Vincent van. [Online] http://www.ibiblio.org/wm/paint/auth/gogh/ , 27-7-06 Unknown. A Dictionary of Twentieth Century Art: Gogh, Vincent Van. [Online] http://www.oxfordreference.com/views/entry.html?subview=Main&entry=t3.e1003 ,28-7-06 Unknown. A Dictionary of Twentieth Century Art: Kahlo, Frida. [Online] http://www.oxfordreference.com/views/entry.html?subview=Main&entry=t3.e1257 , 28-7-06