Symbols In The Two Fridas

Throughout her career, Frida had shown many different themes of her life through her paintings. It seems clear, through analyzation of her paintings, that Frida lived something of a double life. Frida paints herself in distinctly different ways at times, sometimes she is a beautiful woman with strength like iron, and sometimes she is a frail damsel who has been broken already and will be broken again. Contrasting paintings include Self Portrait with Monkeys (Kahlo, 1) and Self-Portrait with Thorn Necklace, Diego and I (Kahlo, 1) and The Love Embrace of the Universe, the Earth (Mexico), Me, Diego, and Mr. Xolotl (Kahlo, 1). All of these paintings show that not only is there a contrast in her personality, in fact, Frida’s is actually two different people, as she paints it.

In contrast with most of Frida’s other paintings, this one actually depicts a few actual aspects. The skeleton, for example, is something Frida truly had on top of her bed; It did not have fireworks attached to it, but rather it was just a life-sized paper mache skeleton named “Juda”. Frida often referred to it as an “amusing reminder of mortality” and she used it for the same reason in this painting. Like previously stated, the skeleton lacks fireworks in real life. Frida actually puts them in to symbolize the suddenness of death and to emphasize her death was to be celebrated. The vines that envelop her body are painted to represent not only life, but also rebirth. The woman in the bed is, in fact, Frida and she looked sickly because, at the time this painting was made, Frida was close to death. Frida, however, does not look sad or mournful, but instead, she looks simply content. The colors used in this painting are bright and happy, something Frida wanted to use to depict a happy and celebratory mood. Lastly, the bed appears to be floating in the sky, levitating towards heaven and also showing the expansiveness of life and death, much like the sky is. The author of the article titled Feel My Pain, Natasha Walters (2005), had this to say about how to interpret Frida’s themes, “If we want to read the art as the story of a woman, we have to be aware that we will never

Frida's artwork has always interested me in many ways. Her paintings are so much more than self-portraits and surrealism. She illustrates her life and the struggles she goes through, even if most would like to ignore the darker aspects of life. The theme of suffering permeates Frida’s self-portraits and often explicitly comprises their subject matter. She visually depicts physical and psychological struggles through the distortions of her body, which is fragmented, doubled, turned inside-out, and merged with non-human elements. She shows me that I can be strong through life even when I'm hurting physically and emotionally. Frida challenged herself and her

You also notice that her clothing and hair are of light color, and she is very detailed. After studying the complex painting closely, you find that the focus of the painting is the Princess.

It is a painting using the swirling turmoil of line to make up the piece. You can tell this is a painting by the different styles of line and color.

This image of Ishmael Beah contains many visual techniques that creates an effect and accurately represents his story. Ishmael is the image’s focal point, his profile enhanced by the lighting, signifying that he is the main character and that he has a story to tell. However, even though he is the focal point of the picture, the children surrounding him still take up more than half of the image. This shows that it doesn’t only take a single person to create the whole picture and the presence of others completes the image as well. Similar to Ishmael Beah’s story, his friends and loved ones’ presence physically and mentally helped him at times when he was so close to giving up, and his story would not be complete without their presence.

In the cleavage area has vertical line as well as horizontal on the dress. The detail the artist put into making sure the dress, belt had the right amount of details to catch everyone’s eye who took time to view his figure. The vertical line on the tassel and the knot tie just right to display the left side of the figure waist line. Indicates the figure was a petite woman. The hair is wavy in the front and pulled into a ponytail at the back. I feel there were serval focal points with in the piece after reexamine the figure the three times. Each time something else stood out shifting my focus from the original focal point. There are many repeats of all the lines with in the figure. The artist only has half of the figure's feet and arms expose which displays start and stopping points for the gown. I feel the use of the white marble may display the cold hardness of the figures heart. The smooth texture of the marble gives a life like feel of the figure. The chair has legs of an animal

In Source 3, The Two Fridas painted by Frida Kahol was shown. It painted around the

To begin with, the most striking feature of this work is that it is a story

I chose this work because the several colors and sizes of circles and complicated compositions on the canvas looked as if it has a special context. I can see very careful and thin brushworks in some circles which are overlapped with other circles; in contrast, the background of this work is used a few sloppy brushstrokes because there are some traces of them. The use of color for the background and most remarkable center circle are so dark, but most circles around it are so colorful secondary and tertiary colors. The composition of it is the several sized and perfect circles with the asymmetrical balance which created a mysterious harmony. If I imagine that the piece is a 3D place, I describe that it is a flat geometric shape because I cannot see any shadows and highlights in the circles which give a three-dimensional feeling, but I can see the depth of them by overlapping each other and distance between the circles and dark background. Therefore, there are many two-dimensional circles spread in the deep and wide dark

Concerning color, there is a stark contrast between the figure on the painting and the background. More specifically, the figure of the woman is predominantly delineated in white color, especially pale, ashen white, as far her apparel and facial complexion are concerned, while there are also various hues of grey, with respect to her hair and accessory feather. These white and grey shades are vividly contrasted with the prevailing red and crimson hues of the background (viz. the drape, armchair, and table). Moreover, one can detect colors of dark green (jewelry), some beige on the left (pillar), and darker or lighter shades of blue on the right side of the canvas (sky), which all in concert and in addition to the subtle purple hue forming the sun or moon exude a certain dramatic sentiment. Also, there is brown, which often easily segues into gold (viz. books and attire details respectively). The main contrast of colors between white and red would be interpreted as serving the purpose of rendering the figure of the woman, and especially her face, the focal point of the work, despite, paradoxically enough, the lush red shades at the background. Bearing that in mind, the significance of the woman’s face will be enlarged upon later, when discussing aspects of her identity.

Since Frida spent most of her time in hospital beds, she used that time to create paintings that documented the major events in her life. In 1937, Kahlo created My Nurse and I, in this painting, a nurse with a mask covering her face has in arms a baby with an adult face of Frida. The backstory of this painting is that Frida’s mother due to complications couldn’t breastfeed her. Her family hired a nurse to breastfeed her. This eventually affected their relationship because she never felt a bond with her mother. There are no connections between her and the wet nurse, you can tell the distance between them, there is no love in this painting. It implies Frida’s feelings of loss and separation form her own mother. In 1940, Frida painted Self Portrait with Thorn

The portrait is displayed horizontally with a gold trimmed frame. The subject is a female that looks to be in her early 20’s sitting upright on a large brown chair. If the viewer travels up the painting the first indication of the woman’s class is her satin, blue dress. The saturated blue shines and falls in the light like water. Paired with the dress are her exceptionally detailed endings to her sleeves. The lace is even painted as though it is translucent, allowing a little of the blue dress to show through the sleeve. Flowers throughout history have symbolized innocence of a woman and her virginity. The repeating theme of flowers, in the sleeve cuffs and ribbon) in the woman’s attired suggests her purity or innocent nature. Another very details section of the painting includes the corset/torso details. The sewing suggests texture in the torso with small beading in between. Towards the top of the chest in the center, the female seems to bear an extravagant, ribbon piece with a tear drop bead in the center. The light pink

The painting is of two versions of Frida Kahlo, closely gripping hands and sharing one heart between them. They are dressed in contrary clothing, with the Frida on the left dressed in modern European garb, while the other to the right is in traditional Mexican clothing. When viewing the painting, we are immediately attracted to the left Frida, who has nearly all of the light in the painting shining down on her. Her European clothing, popular in Mexico at the time, feels very constricting for both the subject and the viewer,specifically the collar grasping her neck so very tightly. Her upright and fragile stance and her almost limp grasp of the second Frida’s is understandable as we see the gaping hole where her heart should be. The pulsating anatomy of her wound bleeds into the room, while her face is completely indifferent. A single vein connects the hole in left Frida to the heart of right Frida. In left Frida’s unclenched hand, a delicate pair of scissors, indicating that she had wretched the heart out of her own bosom. It is this connection that guides us to the Frida to the right, but not before we notice the background behind them. A gray and cloudy backdrop that seems to embody Kahlo’s emotional state at the time, it is hard to distinguish the right Frida from its murky depths. A shadow presiding all around her, the right Frida is dressed in a traditional Mexican dress, with a posture and facial expression completely identical to the other Frida’s. The most eye-catching feature of hers, however, is the pulsating heart that the left Frida is lacking beating out of her chest. This gruesome and oblivious picture is made only more extraordinary when we make out the object right Frida is

This painting is divided into three equal parts by the arches in the background and the characters correspond to each of these arches (TV12). The father is in the middle portion of the painting. The lines of perspective created by the tiled floor, draws our attention to the swords that the father is holding and the vanishing point lies just behind the handles of the sword. Our angle of vision is such that we are looking directly at the main figures groups, particularly the father. A single light source from the left of the picture illuminates the characters and also focuses our attention to the father holding the sword. This creates a ‘theatrical’ effect. The background is simple and stark so our attention is focussed on the figure groups in the painting. The painting has a wide tonal range that makes the composition logical and balanced. The colours used in this