Frida Kahlo Working

Inevitably-

Photo by Lucienne Bloch, 1935

Frida in her Coyoacán studio, 1931.

Nickolas Muray, “Frida Kahlo painting ‘The Two Fridas'” (1939)

When was Frida not working? That’s what I’d like to know. She worked through a great deal of pain, illness, and her recoveries from never-ending surgeries.

By all accounts—her own included—she was a true blue born artist. There are pictures to prove this.

Here she is at 18 with her sisters, photographed by their father Guillermo Kahlo in 1926. Come on—the droopy hankie at 18! This is not a Christmas card sesh; she is working.

Photo by Guillermo Davila, 1929

Just like this is not a smoke break. This cannot be what a smoke break is! Come on! This is working, in that it takes a lot of work to be the one to come up with this whole lewk that the rest of us have been trying to copy for the next century.

Photo by Nickolas Muray, 1941

Also not a smoke break. That is a mustache, though, which has been copied by fewer folks than some of the other elements of this ensemble. And sadly those majority imitators don’t seem to understand that the unibrow and the stache make the lewk, totally!

OK, these two pic might actually be smoke breaks for real. But still, so chic and so beautiful—more beautiful in a way. Pet hawk, hair flowers, uh huh. And who knew cowboy boots looked perfectly wonderful with pajamas? So now let’s copy that too!

Photo by Lucienne Bloch, 1933.