Frida Kahlo: Making Her Self Up
Victoria & Albert Museum, London Until Nov 4
How times have changed. When Frida Kahlo’s death was reported in The New York Times in 1954, the headline referred to her as ‘Diego Rivera’s wife’. Back then, she wasn’t even the most famous artist in her own marriage.
Fast-forward six decades and Kahlo is now celebrated worldwide for her unflinchingly brilliant self-portraits.
Advance ticket sales for a new exhibition about her at the V&A have surpassed even those for the museum’s record-breaking David Bowie show in 2013.
Despite massive advance ticket sales, the V&A’s new Frida Kahlo exhibition is a let-down (above:Self Portrait On The Border Between Mexico And The United States Of America, 1932)
Sadly, however, it’s a let-down. The first issue is space.
This show has been long in the planning, and it was always going to be one of 2018’s blockbusters, yet for some reason it is being held in the cramped surroundings of Gallery 38. Be warned: it’s a scrum in there. (Surely Kahlo would have been more suited to the V&A’s huge new Sainsbury Gallery?)
The lion’s share of exhibits – including the artist’s make-up, jewellery and letters – are from the Frida Kahlo Museum (commonly known as the ‘Casa Azul’) in Mexico City.
There’s no denying the wow factor of the dozen dresses shown together in the final room, most of them highly coloured and heavily patterned.
The lion’s share of exhibits are from the Frida Kahlo Museum in Mexico City and there’s no denying the wow factor of the dozen dresses shown together in the final room
Kahlo was nothing if not political, and her fondness for clothing with indigenous designs reflected a patriotic desire to hark back to the days before Mexico’s conquest by Spain.
She was also a lifelong Communist, though that barely gets a mention – presumably because it’s felt it might jar with the mountain of Kahlo merchandise (from baskets to bracelets) for sale in the V&A shop.
The least enjoyable aspect of this show is the way so many exhibits have the air of relics – most notably, the prosthetic leg that Kahlo was forced to use after a horrific accident aged 18
Perhaps the least enjoyable aspect of this show, though, is the way so many exhibits have the air of relics – most notably, the prosthetic leg and plaster corsets that Kahlo was forced to use after a horrific tram accident aged 18.
Paintings do appear, but they’re all but outnumbered by pill bottles.
On this evidence, you might easily think Kahlo a secular saint rather than one of the 20th century’s great painters.
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