Photos and secret love letters of Frida Kahlo

The artist, known for her exotic beauty, painted fascinating paintings in which her own personality was imprinted. Frida Kahlo's work borders on self-portrait art and visual mythology. Her paintings mixed stories of personal torment and surreal visions generated by the subconscious.

Frida Kahlo was the center of attention, she was photographed no less than any Mexican movie star of those times. But the beautiful pictures depicted only a vivid version of Kahlo's life, leaving behind the scenes the emotional and physical pain that accompanied her for most of her life.

At the age of six, Kahlo fell ill with polio. At the age of 18, she got into a serious accident and received irreparable injuries, being a passenger of a bus that a tram crashed into. Doctors found Frida with a triple fracture of the spine and a broken pelvis three times, as well as 11 fractures of the right leg that had previously suffered from polio, a fragmented foot, a fracture of the collarbone and ribs, a dislocation of the shoulder. Injuries to the abdomen and reproductive organs that caused infertility were severe. After the disaster, the artist underwent many more operations throughout her life, mainly on the spine, and was dependent on painkillers. She desperately wanted to become a mother, but three times the pregnancy tragically ended with a forced termination.

Frida suffered deeply from the inability to give birth to a child. She poured out all her inner torments in her canvases. But in public she was seen invariably persistent, cheerful and amazingly beautiful.

The relationship with her husband Diego Rivera, whom she once called her second accident, also became complicated. Being a popular artist, he aroused the interest of many women, tied endless affairs, bringing incredible suffering to Frida, who was 21 years younger than him. In the end, she herself began to find joy on the side.

From May 21 to September 12, 2015, the multi-faceted beauty of the rebellious artist was presented at the Throckmorton Fine Art Gallery in New York. They showed portraits of Frida Kahlo made by 20 influential photographers of the 20th century, including Andre Breton, Dora Maar, Lola Alvarez Bravo, Imogen Cunningham.

Here are some wonderful photos of Frida Kahlo:

Constant interest is aroused not only by creativity, but also by the personal life of the artist.

This is how the famous Mexican artist turned to Jose Bartoli, a Catalan artist and political refugee who moved to New York to escape the horrors of the Spanish Civil War.

Frida Kahlo and Bartoli met when she was recovering from another spinal surgery. After returning to Mexico, she left Bartoli, but their secret romance continued at a distance. The correspondence lasted for several years, affecting the artist's painting, her health and her relationship with her husband.

Bartoli kept more than 100 pages of love letters written between August 1946 and November 1949 until his death in 1995, then the correspondence passed into the hands of his family.

Despite the fact that they lived in different cities and rarely saw each other, the relationship between the artists lasted for three years. They exchanged sincere declarations of love hidden in sensual and poetic works. Frida painted the double self-portrait "The Tree of Hope" after one of her meetings with Bartoli.

Hayden Herrera, Frida's biographer, notes in his essay for Doyle New York that Kahlo signed letters to Bartoli "Maara". This is probably an abbreviated version of the nickname "Maravillosa". And Bartoli wrote to her under the name "Sonya". This conspiracy was an attempt to avoid the jealousy of Diego Rivera. According to rumors, among other affairs, the artist was in a relationship with Isamu Noguchi and with Josephine Baker. Rivera, who endlessly and openly cheated on his wife, turned a blind eye to her entertainment with women, but reacted violently to connections with men.

Frida Kahlo's letters to Jose Bartoli were never published. They reveal new information about one of the most important artists of the 20th century. The correspondence is diluted with old photographs of Kahlo and Bartoli.