Frida Kahlo was born in Coyoacan, Mexico. She was an artist who produced paintings that were very small in size but grandiose in personal meaning. Most of her paintings were self-portraits, which identified her personality, her pain, and her culture. And it is this why it has been said that her style was inspired by native popular art. While attending the National Preparatory School in the year 1925, she suffered a drastic bus accident in which she was badly hurt, and had to go through a long and painful recuperation that lasted a life time.

The Influence

            Frida fought not a war of bullets, but one that in which death bulleted her health. After that tragic accident with the bus and the train cart, Frida went through numerous operations and painful relapses. All which combined to make Frida Kahlo’s life miserable.

            Frida’s life from 1925 on was a cruel battle against slow decay. She had continuous feeling of fatigue, and almost constant pain in her spine and right leg. There were periods when she felt more or less well and her limp was almost unnoticeable, but gradually the good period turned to a nightmare. As you can see in the painting The Little Deer Frida painted herself as a deer who slowly dies after being hit by many arrows. the pain she felt can be best seen in her face.

            "I never thought of painting until 1926, when I was in bed. I was bore (……) in bed with a plaster cast, so I decided to do something. I stole (sic) from my father some oil paints, and my mother made me a special easel, and I started to paint." Commented the artist"(Herrera).

And it was this desire to paint that led Frida to the hands of Diego Rivera, who would later in life comfort and at the same time cause an even greater amount of pain to Frida. Their marriage was well at first, but later when Frida attempted to have a child everything felt apart, she was not able to bear children and even though she attempted many times, the incapacity on which the accident had left her didn’t permit the birth of her children.

"Frida Kahlo: A Biography", by Hayden Herrera.