Renowned Mexican artist Frida Kahlo was born in, and lived and died in, Casa Azul (Blue House), now a museum. Almost every visitor to Mexico City makes a pilgrimage here to gain a deeper understanding of the painter (and maybe to pick up a Frida handbag). Arrive early to avoid the crowds, especially on weekends; book tickets online to jump the queue.
Built by Frida's father Guillermo three years before her birth, the house is littered with mementos and personal belongings that evoke her long, often tempestuous relationship with husband Diego Rivera and the leftist intellectual circle they often entertained here. Kitchen implements, jewelry, photos and other objects from the artist’s everyday life are interspersed with art, as well as a variety of pre-Hispanic pieces and Mexican crafts. The collection was greatly expanded in 2007 after the discovery of a cache of previously unseen items that had been stashed in the attic. Since 2012 the exhibition "Appearances Can Be Deceiving: The Dresses of Frida Kahlo" places the focus on Kahlo's image and famous style, displaying many of the dresses uncovered in her bathroom, alongside her spine-straightening corsets. The intersection of her disability, fashion sense, artistic themes and fame is a worthy exploration. In fact, a version of this exhibition toured to the V&A Museum in London in 2018.
Kahlo’s art expresses the anguish of her existence as well as her flirtation with socialist icons: portraits of Lenin and Mao hang around her bed and, in another painting, Retrato de la familia (Family Portrait), the artist’s Hungarian-Oaxacan roots are fancifully entangled.
In the entrance hall, Kahlo's first self-portrait, Self-Portrait in a Velvet Dress (1926), depicts the pain of being abandoned by her first love, Alejandro Gómez Arias, after she was disfigured in a streetcar accident. Bedridden, 19-year-old Kahlo sent the painting to Alejandro imploring him to visit, but she never saw him again.
On display in the living room, her last painting, Viva la Vida (Long Live Life), was signed eight days before her death in 1954 and is a still life of watermelons. It could be understood to celebrate a vibrant inner life, perhaps ironically considering her physical pain at the time.
It's a pleasant 1.5km walk here from metro Coyoacán.
