Frida, Diego and me, 1949 by Atelier Liesjes

About "Frida, Diego and me, 1949"

by Atelier Liesjes

About the artwork

"Diego y yo" was the last self-portrait bust Frida painted. In her face, on the glabella, there is the shape of a third eye where the image of Diego Rivera emerges, and from it another third eye appears. The couple had met in 1922; their romance began in 1928, and they married the following year. In this work, the merging of the two figures and the tears rolling down Frida's cheekbones allude to the turbulent and passionate relationship they had for decades. Dualism, a common theme in her production related to her personal experiences and the human and universal dialectic - body and mind, sun and moon, life and death - emerges here in the contrast between Frida and Diego's image, which refers to the feminine and masculine. The same motifs were unfolded in another oil painting produced in the same year, "El abrazo de amor del universo, la tierra (México), yo, Diego y el señor Xolotl" [The Love Embrace of the Universe, the Earth (Mexico), Me , Diego and Senor Xolotl], where Rivera is depicted as a baby in Frida's arms, both protected by an anthropomorphic figure in a landscape that in turn connects them to the earth and the cosmos.

Magdalena Carmen Frida y Calderón (Coyoacán, Mexico, 6 July 1907 - 13 July 1954) was a Mexican surrealist painter.

Frida's work is characterised by cheerful colours, but contrasted with an alienating atmosphere. She did not shy away from controversy.