 The Calderón González family inscribed ‘Mother (Oaxaca) Matilde Calderón age 7 1890’ Ricardo Ayluardo. Frida’s mother’s family in a mix of European and Tehuana dress. The Vincente Wolf Collection. (My photo of photo) |  The Kahlo Calderón family, Guillermo Kahlo, 7 February 1926, Coyoacán, Mexico. Gender-fluid Frida, possibly wearing a suit belonging to her father. Banco de México Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo Museums Trust. (My photo of photo) |  Frida Kahlo with family members, Guillermo Kahlo, 2 November 1926, Coyoacán, Mexico. Banco de México Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo Museums Trust. (My photo of photo) |
Seventy five years after her death, fourteen years after her personal belongings were rediscovered, this exhibition is a rediscovery of - a reintroduction to - Frida Kahlo. Co-curated by Circe Henestrosa* and Claire Wilcox, it’s a moving, haunting, intimate experience – even with other people around; the (tonal?) soundtrack adds to that feeling. Film footage shows a vivacious Kahlo with Rivera, and provides glimpses of the Mexico they lived in. As you progress through the rooms you are increasingly immersed in her world, culminating in the room with her outfits, which feels almost like entering a shrine – complete with grand entrance. The busts displaying her jewellery echo the bandage textures of her plaster corsets. The experience is beautiful, sensual, playful, unsettling, inspiring; layers and facets of Frida Kahlo in three dimensions.
 Display homage to 'The Two Fridas'. Left: silk velvet cape with pointed tails (early 1900s), and silk skirt; right: Tehuana outfit. |  Corridor to the room of Frida's outfits. |
 ‘Self-Portrait as a Tehuana’ Frida Kahlo, 1943. The Jacques and Natalia Gelman collection of 20th Century Mexican Art and the Vergel collection. (My photo of painting) |  Side back view of huipil grande/resplandor. |  Resplandor/huipil grande (ceremonial lace headdress) and skirt. |
‘I paint myself because I am so often alone.’
You can’t separate Frida Kahlo’s art from her appearance – not least because she painted self-portraits – her appearance and her art brought together and reflected all the influences in her life in her own unique style. She wasn’t just a muse to herself, as can be seen from the photographs taken of her during her life by her father, friends and lovers. She’s still a muse, her image instantly recognisable, and endlessly reproduced, reworked and experimented with by others. Even now she seems so modern – her gender-fluidity, her frankness about her personal life and state of being. I keep wondering what she’d have made of Instagram had she been alive today – would she have thought it was too commercial, or would she have created her own political memes, posted outfit inspirations and choices, shown works in progress?
You can’t separate Frida Kahlo’s art from her appearance – not least because she painted self-portraits – her appearance and her art brought together and reflected all the influences in her life in her own unique style. She wasn’t just a muse to herself, as can be seen from the photographs taken of her during her life by her father, friends and lovers. She’s still a muse, her image instantly recognisable, and endlessly reproduced, reworked and experimented with by others. Even now she seems so modern – her gender-fluidity, her frankness about her personal life and state of being. I keep wondering what she’d have made of Instagram had she been alive today – would she have thought it was too commercial, or would she have created her own political memes, posted outfit inspirations and choices, shown works in progress?
 Cotton huipil with machine-embroidered chain stitch; printed cotton skirt with embroidery and holán. Ensemble from the Isthmus of Tehuantepec. Photograph Javier Hinojosa. © Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo Archives, Banco de México, Fiduciary of the Trust of the Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo Museums. |  Frida on the bench, 1939, photograph by Nickolas Muray © Nickolas Muray Photo Archives. |
 Embroidered huipil; embroidered enagua; holán. Cotton velvet huipil; enagua; holán. |  Fringed magenta rebozo (seen in Nickolas Muray’s photographs of Frida); brocaded cotton huipil; silk skirt. Embroidered huipil; silk skirt; holán. Striped rebozo (rectangular shawl); silk skirt with panel of Chinese embroidery; holán. |  Polka dot huipil; embroidered enagua (skirt); holán. Puebla blouses with enagua and rabona skirts, Blouse on left has panel of glass beads – such pieces are often heirlooms. Outfit on right features rebozo. |
‘I must have full skirts and long, now that my sick leg is so ugly.’
The Tehuana dress that Frida Kahlo began wearing in her twenties was for her a combination of camouflage and cultural pride. The long, wide, ruffled skirts hid the leg that had been affected by polio, and the square-cut huipil tops were comfortable to wear over her orthopaedic corsets. She mixed and matched Tehuana pieces with European, sometimes adding elements of Chinese embroidery, and finished with torzales (long gold chains), necklaces of Mexican silver, pre-Columbian jade beads, and her hair adorned with bright wool and flowers. Her appearance combined past and present in a way that has become almost timeless. It is extraordinary to see these pieces in real life, shown next to the photographs and paintings they appear in. These are clothes that she lived in – you can see stains, a speck of paint, fabric worn thin – the working wardrobe of a remarkable woman.
The Tehuana dress that Frida Kahlo began wearing in her twenties was for her a combination of camouflage and cultural pride. The long, wide, ruffled skirts hid the leg that had been affected by polio, and the square-cut huipil tops were comfortable to wear over her orthopaedic corsets. She mixed and matched Tehuana pieces with European, sometimes adding elements of Chinese embroidery, and finished with torzales (long gold chains), necklaces of Mexican silver, pre-Columbian jade beads, and her hair adorned with bright wool and flowers. Her appearance combined past and present in a way that has become almost timeless. It is extraordinary to see these pieces in real life, shown next to the photographs and paintings they appear in. These are clothes that she lived in – you can see stains, a speck of paint, fabric worn thin – the working wardrobe of a remarkable woman.
 Detail of holán (ruffle/flounce) with worn patch. |  Detail of holán with two layers in different patterns. |  Detail of satin rabona (skirt) |
 Kahlo’s sewing box and threads, and a rag doll probably made by her. |  Detail of stained silk skirt with woven velvet flowers and pleated hem. |  Pre-Columbian jade beads – including a carved fist – probably strung by Frida Kahlo. |
I’ve seen this twice now and it’s still rather overwhelming; I’ll be going back again later in the year because I don’t feel I’ve finished with this exhibition yet! Rediscover the woman behind the icon; see this exhibition!
Frida Kahlo: Making Her Self Up, 16 June – 4 November 2018. Sponsored by Grosvenor Britain & Ireland, Aeromexico, Art Mentor Foundation Lucerne and GRoW @ Anneberg.
www.vam.ac.uk/exhibitions/frida-kahlo-making-her-self-up
*Circe Henestrosa also curated ‘Appearances Can Be Deceiving:
The dresses of Frida Kahlo’ at Museo Frida Kahlo in 2012: www.museofridakahlo.org.mx/esp/1/exposiciones/los-vestidos-de-frida-kahlo
Frida Kahlo: Making Her Self Up, 16 June – 4 November 2018. Sponsored by Grosvenor Britain & Ireland, Aeromexico, Art Mentor Foundation Lucerne and GRoW @ Anneberg.
www.vam.ac.uk/exhibitions/frida-kahlo-making-her-self-up
*Circe Henestrosa also curated ‘Appearances Can Be Deceiving:
The dresses of Frida Kahlo’ at Museo Frida Kahlo in 2012: www.museofridakahlo.org.mx/esp/1/exposiciones/los-vestidos-de-frida-kahlo
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