Frida Kahlo

I've been reading the diary of Frida Kahlo. Amazing stuff. I had never realized how much suffering was at the root of her work, but now I wonder how I didn't notice. She was active in creating her own mythology of self to the point that she claimed the year of the Mexican Revolution as the year of her birth. I can understand why, though. Having gone to Mexico and seen the murals of Orozco in the city hall of Guadalajara, I can say that the cultural energy released in 1910 was significant. It was pretty clear to me after just a few days that Mexico's culture is far from derivative.

Kahlo's diary seems to have three pillars of obsession: Diego Rivera, Communism and Kahlo's own body. Artists' diaries always make me jealous, though, because of all the drawing and the inevitably cool handwriting. Kahlo was definitely a surrealist, but aimed to root herself in indigenous culture. And I don't mean indigenous as just pre-Columbian, but indigenously modern as well, in terms of the living Mexican culture.