Frida Kahlo und Diego Rivera: Leidenschaft, Politik und Malerei

„Diego schoss einmal auf ein Grammophon während einer von Tinas Partys. Das war zu der Zeit, als ich mich für ihn interessierte, obwohl ich mich vor ihm fürchtete.“ Frida Kahlo

Wenn sich zwei exzentrische Künstler ineinander verlieben – und das lehrt uns nicht nur Hollywood – geht das in der Regel nicht gut aus. Und in der Tat konnte man die im Jahr 1929 zwischen Diego Rivera (1886-1957) und Frida Kahlo (1907-1954) geschlossene Ehe nicht gerade als gesund bezeichnen. Die beiden gaben schon vom Erscheinungsbild her ein ungleiches Paar ab: Rivera, der stämmige Revolutionär und die zwanzig Jahre jüngere und neben ihm noch kleiner und zierlicher wirkende Kahlo – „petite, eine kleine Puppe neben Diego“, notierte der Fotograf Edward Weston (1886 - 1958) bei seiner ersten Begegnung mit Kahlo in seinem Tagebuch, „aber eine Puppe nur der Größe nach, weil sie stark und ziemlich schön ist.“


Frida Kahlo, Frida und Diego Rivera, 1931.
Öl auf Leinwand, 100 x 79 cm.
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco.

Anders als bei dem akademisch ausgebildeten Rivera, trat die Malerei ganz plötzlich und unter negativen Umständen in Frida Kahlos Leben: Bei einem Busunglück im Jahr 1925 bohrte sich eine Stahlstange durch ihr Becken. Für lange Zeit ans Bett gefesselt, begann sie aus reinem Zeitvertreib zu malen. Damit sie sich selbst als Modell dienen konnte, befestigte ihre Mutter einen Spiegel an ihrem Bett. Während Rivera in seinen großformatigen Historiengemälden das gesellschaftliche Leben von Mexiko darstellte und die Anhänger der mexikanischen Revolution von 1910 idealisierte, bannte sie ihr Inneres auf die Leinwand, umgab sich auf ihren intimen, selbstreflektiven Selbstporträts mit einer Vielzahl von Puppen und Tieren und schuf sich so ihre eigene, farbenfrohe Realität.


Frida Kahlo, Diego und ich, 1949.
Öl auf Holzfaserplatte, 61 x 45 cm.
Privatsammlung, New York.


Diego Rivera, Volkstümliche Geschichte Mexikos, 1953.
Mosaik. Theatro de los Insurgentes, Mexiko-Stadt.

Nach zahlreichen Affären und Streitigkeiten und der ständigen Eskapaden ihres Mannes überdrüssig, ließ sich Kahlo 1939 von ihm scheiden, heiratete ihn jedoch ein Jahr später erneut. Die Malerei half ihr, ihren körperlichen und seelischen Schmerz, ihre Selbstzweifel und Beziehungsprobleme zum Ausdruck zu bringen und diese so gut es ging zu bewältigen. Anders als Rivera, der hauptberuflich Hunderte von großen Fresken schuf und zu Lebzeiten des Künstlerpaares als bedeutendster Wandmaler Mexikos galt, schuf Kahlo zeit ihres Lebens weniger als 150 kleinformatige Werke, eine Zahl, die, gemessen an Riveras umfangreichem und gefeiertem Werk wahrlich nicht groß ist. Und dennoch konnte sie sich später mit ihren Arbeiten nben ihrem Mann als eigenständige, autodidaktische Künstlerin behaupten.

Die aktuelle Ausstellung Frida & Diego: Passion, Politics and Painting in der Art Gallery of Ontario präsentiert noch bis zum 20. Januar 2013 mehr als 80 Arbeiten und mehr als 60 Fotografien des Künstlerehepaares. Die Werke stammen aus den drei mexikanischen Privatsammlungen Museo Dolores Olmedo, Colección Gelman und der Galería Arvil und offenbaren die dramatische Lebensgeschichte des Paares, ihre Leidenschaft füreinander und für die revolutionäre Kultur Mexikos der 1920er und 1930er Jahre.

Die dramtische Geschichte des Paares, ergänzt durch zahlreiche Farbbabbildungen, Briefe und Tagebucheinträge können Sie auch in den im Verlag Parkstone-International erschienenen Büchern Frida Kahlo & Diego Rivera, Frida Kahlo - Hinter dem Spiegel, Kahlo und Rivera nachlesen.

 

-C.Schmidt

A Life Most Solitary?

The place: Mexico.  The year: Post-1910. Viva la revolución!  Mexico was on the verge of change.  Political instability, the blight of dictatorship, a peasants’ revolt.  If Margaret Mitchell had penned a novel in the midst of such a setting, surely a turbulent love story to equal that of ‘Gone with the Wind’ would have ensued.

We need only look to those well-known Mexican painters Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera for reference.  I could argue that with events such as the Mexican Revolution fresh in everyone’s minds, passions must have run high.  Actions were no longer as restrained.  The freedoms of speech and desire were rife.

Despite the volatile relationship shared by the painters (both of whom had several extra-marital affairs during their time together), I’m going to go out on a limb and say that Kahlo lived in an isolated world.  A pain-filled existence was all she ever knew from the age of 6, when she contracted polio, leaving her left leg crippled. At 18 she was left with life-long injuries following a severe bus accident, including a perforated abdomen and uterus, which led to three terminated pregnancies in later life.

These experiences, and the pain that followed, must undoubtedly have trapped her in a separate universe from her contemporaries.  What solace she may have been looking for in her relationships and affairs, she truly found in her art.  In her art, she was able to express herself.  In her art, she was able to share her suffering.  In her art, she was able to heal.

 


The Two Fridas, 1939. Oil on canvas, 173.5 x 173 cm, Museo de Arte Moderno, Mexico City 



Many of her paintings are self-portraits, symbolising the solitude that she felt; her own figure and visage being the one that she was most familiar with.  However, in several of her paintings she also references Diego, either as a symbol of love or of pain.

One painting which perhaps best characterises the depth of her feelings for Rivera is ‘The two Fridas’.  A double portrait of herself, it shows the Frida that was rejected by Diego at the time of their divorce.  Her heart has been broken, and is bleeding.  The Frida on the right is the Frida that Diego still loves; her heart is whole, and she is holding a small portrait of Diego in her hand.

Amongst her self-portraits, monkeys are a common feature.  In Mexico, the monkey is a symbol of lust.  Kahlo transformed this conception into one of tenderness.  In her painting ‘Self-portrait with monkeys’ she places four monkeys directly around herself, all with tender expression. Two of the monkeys have their paws over her heart.  We may be able to interpret this as her desire for love, not lust.  She is expressing heartache and a desire for a single commitment of love, most probably from Diego, as this was painted during her second marriage to the artist.


Self-Portrait with Monkeys, 1943. Oil on canvas, 81.5 x 63 cm, Jacques and Natasha Gelman Collection, Mexico City

Whilst perhaps it is a good thing that not all scorned, lovesick, hurting women are artists, or have the ability to pen songs – hello, Taylor Swift – (the world would be left reeling at the amount of pent up angst unleashed!),  I for one am grateful for the artistic talents of Frida Kahlo.  Her honesty is touching, her emotions relatable, and her story compelling.  I read it as inspirational that the solitary pain of one woman has the potential ability to affect and heal the lives of others; through her art, it is possible to understand and come to terms with the realms of human emotion.

 

For a closer look at the turbulent life of Kahlo and Rivera in painting, Canadians rejoice!  The Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto is hosting an exhibition of their works, as well as several photographs of the couple, from the 20^th October 2012 – 20^th January 2013.  As well as showing their lives together, these combined works also reflect the couple’s interest in the changing values of post-revolutionary Mexico.  For those living a little too far away from the Canadian border, these paintings can also be found in the works by Gerry Souter: Frida Kahlo and Rivera. 

Répine, peintre de la Russie impériale ou révolutionnaire ?

Les Bateliers de la Volga, 1870-1873.
Huile sur toile, 131,5 × 281 cm.
Musée d’État Russe, Saint-Pétersbourg.

Les Bateliers de la Volga. Des hommes en plein labeur, des cordes nouées autour de leur poitrine, tirent, traînent de lourds bateaux plein de marchandise. Hommes ou bêtes de somme ? Ils avancent imperturbables, les yeux perdus dans le vide, tout à cette tâche qui leur permet de survivre.

Ilya Répine, peintre de la Russie du tsar. C’est ce que l’on pourrait penser d’un peintre connu pour ses toiles historiques ou ses portraits de personnages officiels. Et pourtant bien au contraire, je dirais que Répine a été le peintre du peuple russe, celui montrant la réalité de la vie difficile en Russie au début du xx^e siècle. Les Bateliers de la Volga en est l’exemple parfait.

Il campe ses personnages en pleine souffrance ou dans des scènes anecdotiques du quotidien. Dans ses portraits, le modèle n’est jamais mis en valeur, mais bien représenté tel qu’il est, jeune, vieux, beau ou laid.

Imaginez l’écrivain Léon Tolstoï labourant un champ dans sa maison de campagne. Il a certainement dû le faire car, proche de la terre, il possédait un vaste domaine agricole, mais c’est une scène mettant à mal son image d’intellectuel auprès du grand public : Répine l’a osée.


Ilya Répine, Léon Tolstoï labourant un champ, 1887.
Huile sur carton, 27,8 x 40,3 cm.
Galerie d’État Tretiakov, Moscou.


Séance solennelle du Conseil d’État le 7 mai 1901, 1903.
Huile sur toile, 400 x 877 cm.
Musée d’État Russe, Saint-Pétersbourg.

Mais comme pour échapper à ce dur monde populaire, il peint aussi des portraits de personnages officiels, des scènes politiques, la vie des proches du tsar. Il assiste par exemple à des séances de l’Assemblée russe et n’oublie aucun des hommes qui faisaient la vie politique d’alors. Quel écart entre ces notables en habits officiels, pleins de vie et bien nourris, et les malheureux travaillant le long de la Volga, chaque jour courbés sur la misère de leur vie.

Ses toiles sincères et détaillées seront considérées comme des témoignages précis de l’oppression tsariste pour le régime communiste, qui va les utiliser pour sa propagande. Répine est le peintre de la vie politique, rurale, intime du peuple russe au début du xx^e siècle. De la Volga à la Douma, que d’imagination !

Le musée Bunkamura présente en ce moment une sélection des œuvres de ce grand peintre russe. Si vous ne pouvez faire le déplacement jusqu’au Japon, vous pouvez consulter le livre Ilya Répine de Grigori Sternin et Jelena Kirillina.

Ilya Repin: Stalin’s Golden Boy

Ukrainian-born Ilya Repin’s life spanned the turn of the 20^th century, a particularly turbulent period in Russian history. A member of the Itinerants, he is one of the most celebrated social realist painters of all time, painting the lives of poor peasants and revolutionaries in exquisite detail, eschewing the burgeoning contemporary European impressionist movement. His paintings are a satirical commentary on the contemporary society of the Russian Empire, depicting scenes of peasantry (‘Barge Haulers on the Volga’), political and military scenes (‘Demonstration 17 October 1905’) and Cossack life (‘The Reply of the Zaporozhian Cossacks to Sultan Mahmoud IV’).

Soon after his death in 1930, Repin had developed into a cult figure. Revered by Stalin (supposedly his “favourite artist”*), his realistic portrayals of daily life inspired the ‘Socialist Realism’ of the new, centralised USSR. This genre depicted the suffering working classes as heroic in their struggles, which became heightened as the “elite” of the Stalinist regime were hypocritically bathing in the excesses that the position afforded them.

Stalin and Repin had similar beginnings, in that they were born into poorer families, in non-Russian soviet republics; the former being a Bolshevik revolutionary, whilst the latter was undoubtedly a sympathiser in the fight for social justice. However, somewhere along the way Stalin’s desire to escape the misery of his childhood lead to an abandonment of his roots, a skewing of his principles and a misappropriation of Repin’s work to champion his newly-held ideals.


Ilya Repin, Leo Tolstoy as a Ploughman on a Field, 1887.
Oil on cardboard, 27.8 x 40.3 cm.
The State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow

Why is it that there is so often a discrepancy between the austere measures a regime advocates for its citizens and the lavish lifestyle the officials themselves lead? From examples as tame as the privately educated millionaires that make up the current British government, and the ostentation of the Pope, to the more extreme cases of autocrats living the high-life whilst their citizens starve, this is evident the world over and repeated cyclically.

As power turns heads, it also turns minds. A love of art may become more sterile, as only ‘state-approved’ art get the seal of approval. Hitler approved of the Great Masters, where the spiritual morality and family values depicted could be manipulated to suit his own manifesto, as well as having art made to order by his favourite, compliant artists. Under most dictatorships, artistic intelligentsia are driven underground for fear of being purged, either for vocally dissenting from the regime, or due to the expectation that they would do so.


Ilya Repin, Putting a Propagandist Under Arrest, 1880-1889.
Oil on canvas, 34.8 x 54.6 cm.
The State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow.

Ironically, if Repin had been alive during Stalin’s reign of terror, it is reasonable to believe that he would have been painting scenes to satirise this monstrous hypocrite and his actions that, amongst other things, lead to around 7 million of Repin’s compatriots starving to death during the Ukrainian Famine of 1933. And had he lived on to lampoon, he would almost certainly no longer have been Stalin’s golden boy.

If you happen to be in Tokyo, check out the Bunkamura Museum where they are holding an exhibition (‘ILYA REPIN: Master Works from the State Tretyakov Gallery’, until Monday 8 October) featuring 80 Repin works on loan from the State Tretyakov Gallery. If Japan seems like a long way to go to see Repin’s works, why not try this Ilya Repin ebook instead, featuring many more masterpieces by this excellent realist painter.

* Rappeport, H. (1999). Art and Architecture. In: Joseph Stalin: A Biographical Companion. (p. 7). California: ABC-CLIO, Inc.