Creative Thresholds

Frida Kahlo Broken Column 1944 http://image.slidesharecdn.com/newcastlepresentation-091006061556-phpapp02/95/selfimaging-and-trauma-2-728.jpg?cb=1254810108

Self-Portraits

noun

1.a portrait of oneself done by oneself.

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/self-portrait

Self-portrait has just as long a history as painting itself, but often with little note. It is often considered a “stand in” when there is no model available. It’s a way painters keep their skills sharp by using themselves in place of a model. Due to the aforementioned, self-portraits are not really considered worthy of proper analysis and quickly moved aside to focus on the artist’s primary work.

The obvious decision by Kahlo to place the practice of self-portraiture as the primary methodology of her work is very interesting. That she then goes on to have so much revisionary success should also be discussed. For a proper analysis of Kahlo’s work the primary focus should consider her main point of interest. This focus can easily be identified in the relentless interrogation of herself, which is then put on display for everyone to see, in her self-portraits. It is in this simple choice Kahlo reveals a supreme understanding of reality, not fiction. Kahlo’s is unmatched in her unbiased representation of self that is completely honest.

No artist has left a loftier or more penetrating personal testament than Rembrandt van Rijn. In more than 90 portraits of himself that date from the outset of his career in the 1620s to the year of his death in 1669, he created an autobiography in art that is the equal of the finest ever produced in literature even of the intimately analytical Confessions of St. Augustine http://www.rembrandtpainting.net/rembrandt_self_portraits.htm

Rembrandt
Self-Portrait
1658
133.67 cm x 10.32 cm.
Frick Collection, New York
http://c300221.r21.cf1.rackcdn.com/rembrandt-self-portrait-1658-1341032609_b.jpg

It is very difficult to produce more than one self-portrait without becoming super conscious of one’s own vanity. It is then easy for that vanity to be forced onto the viewer as a vulgar statement of the artist’s ego. Vanity suggests to the artist, “you should make yourself look like a king” and it keeps suggesting until it completely takes over. It is not an easy thing to deny vanity for the purpose of internal investigation. Vanity is interested in the external.

Yes, Rembrandt is known as being one of the most prolific self –portrait artists but his self –portraits are vulgar displays of vanity. Rembrandt’s self-portraits are boring in comparison Kahlo’s. They fail to surpass the painted surface and communicate anything other than mastery of skill. Sure his paintings are filled with the bold dramatic lighting which the baroque period praised, but Rembrandt used himself as a study for developing his own technical skill.

This reveals the genius of Kahlo. She only uses the study of oneself as the primary drive behind her work. Her sketches surpass the intent and technique of Rembrandt by focusing on the on the same form and interrogating it, not for lighting or technical expertise.

Van Gogh Self-portrait with Bandaged Ear, Easel and Japanese Print, January 1889 Oil on canvas, 60 × 49 cm https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portraits_of_Vincent_van_Gogh#/media/File:VanGogh-self-portrait-with_bandaged_ear.jpg

Van Gogh is also another prolific self- portrait artist. His self -portraits also do not surpass the utilitarian use of the self-portrait. They are mere studies of brush work and color, investigating technique. It is well documented that he was deeply disturbed but these paintings aren’t. They are controlled illustrations of a man in turmoil. This is an artist that is too self-conscious of self to actually communicate a direct visceral response.

Chuck Close in 1968 with his ‘Big Self-Portrait’ (1967-1968).
https://beckchris.wordpress.com/people/best-contemporary-visual-artists-the-critics-picks/

Chuck Close has followed the tradition of vulgar displays of ego on an immense scale. Close has dedicated the majority of his artistic career to the portrait and self-portrait. He made a name for himself with these oversized super technical self-portraits. He has used the “study” as the primary focus but only succeeds at communicating technique.

Artist:Frida Kahlo
Start Date: 1940
Completion Date:1943
Style:Naïve Art (Primitivism)
Genre:self-portrait
Technique:oil
Material: masonite
Dimensions: 76 x 61 cm
http://uploads7.wikiart.org/images/magdalena-carmen-frieda-kahlo-y-calder%C3%B3n-de-rivera/self-portrait-as-a-tehuana-1943.jpg

Art schools teach artists to look outside themselves for inspiration. They point artists to follow the success of artists that came before, located in the Western canon. Then, once the students have learned the Western canon, they can now think about self. Kahlo used a primary investigation of self as the driving force. There are thousands of portrait paintings made of Frida Kahlo by her adoring fans that do not succeed in more than technique. Kahlo would not want you to spend your time interrogating your own practice. She would want you to spend time interrogating yourself.

Christopher Hutchinson is an accomplished Jamaican conceptual artist, professor and contributor to the art community as a writer, critic and founder of the nonprofit Smoke School of Art. He is a Professor of Art at Atlanta Metropolitan State College and has been featured as a lecturer including prestigious engagements at University of Alabama and the Auburn Avenue Research Library. For two decades, Chris has been a practicing artist. His works have been exhibited in internationally recognized institutions including City College New York (CUNY) and featured at the world’s leading international galleries such as Art Basel Miami. He has always had an innate passion for creating spaces where Africans and people of African descent contribute to an inclusive contemporary dialogue—ever evolving, not reflexive but pioneering. This requires challenging the rubric of the canon of art history, a systemic space of exclusion for the Other: women and non-Whites, and where necessary he rewrites it. He received his Master of Fine Arts Degree in Painting from Savannah College of Art & Design, Atlanta and his Bachelor of Arts Degree from the University of Alabama in Huntsville, Alabama.

by Christopher Hutchinson

Frida Kahlo
http://www.biobiochile.cl/2012/11/22/frida-kahlo-un-estilo-mexicano-que-inspiro-a-la-moda-internacional.shtml

Frida Kahlo was a Mexican Surrealist painter who has achieved international popularity. She typically painted self-portraits using vibrant colours in a style that was influenced by cultures of Mexico as well as influences from European Surrealism. Her self-portraits were often an expression of her life and her pain.

http://www.arthistoryarchive.com/arthistory/surrealism/Frida-Kahlo.html

Surrealisms’s love of the exotic

Id, ego, and super-ego are the three parts of the psychic apparatus defined in Sigmund Freud’s structural model of the psyche; they are the three theoretical constructs in terms of whose activity and interaction our mental life is described. According to this model of the psyche, the id is the set of uncoordinated instinctual trends; the super-ego plays the critical and moralizing role; and the ego is the organized, realistic part that mediates between the desires of the id and the super-ego.[1] The super-ego can stop one from doing certain things that one’s id may want to do.[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Id,_ego_and_super-egos

Surrealism’s interest in the exotic begins initially with surrealism’s art mission to be the artifacts of Sigmund Freud’s psychoanalytic theories. The exoticism presented in Freud’s Id became surrealist illustrations of the “primitive” from a Western perspective. Initially, accessing the “primitive” was merely a jumping off point, to access the inner psyche that was not so heavily governed by the stifling rules of Western painting. This use of the “primitive” is the second overtly appropriation of Africa from the West within a 20 year span from Picasso’s Cubism/African art. The “primitive” of surrealism is slightly different than the direct appropriation of Picasso. It is cloaked in the entitlement of Freud’s writings. Freud gives the surrealists permission to investigate the “primitive” that lies dormant within all humanity. We just have to access it.

This principle of Freud brings about terrible surrealist works that play on this Id/primitive concept “juxtaposed” its binary, the “norm”. Carefully composed compositions that have a jarring effect simply because object and images are not unified in a linear way. Jamming two things together that doesn’t relate to each other in any way is not an exploration. It is not a development of an aesthetic. It is at best a one-liner never to be thought of again, at its worst the work just gets swallowed up in the litany of icons like the yin and yang, tragedy and comedy symbols, and it leads ultimately boring work. It is amazing that this juxtaposition method still exists.

Man Ray 1926
Kiki-de-Montparnasse
http://www.wikiart.org/en/man-ray/black-and-white

This photograph of Kiki de Montparnasse’s head next to an African ceremonial mask bears a title that references both the black and white process of photography as well as skin color. It was created at a time when African art and culture was much in vogue. The oval faces of the two almost look identical in their serene expressions, but he contrasts her soft pale face with the shiny black mask. He simplifies the conflict of society into a problem of lighting and imagery in aesthetics – one oval next to another oval; one laying on its side contrasted with another that is erect; one lit from above and the other from the side http://www.wikiart.org/en/man-ray/black-and-white

Is Frida Khalo’s exotic inclusion to surrealism valid?

Exotic:

Adjective 1. of foreign origin or character; not native; introduced from abroad, but not fully naturalized or acclimatized: exotic foods; exotic plants. 2. strikingly unusual or strange in effect or appearance: an exotic hairstyle. 3. of a uniquely new or experimental nature: The flower show included several tropical exotics with showy blooms. http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/exotic

The surrealist intentionally tried to be as exotic as possible as an indicator of their Id/primitive quality. Is Frida Kahlo purposefully attempting to be exotic? Is her every day dress a costume? Is she exotic to herself? Of course not. What has occurred here is not unique by any means to Western history. Kahlo is forcefully adopted into a vernacular that is not her own, yet she still paints honestly.   Kahlo is not just jamming things together and hoping they create something new.

Frida Khalo the two Fridas
http://www.biobiochile.cl/2012/11/22/frida-kahlo-un-estilo-mexicano-que-inspiro-a-la-moda-internacional.shtml

As with all Western discoveries, the indigenous contribution is eliminated, leaving just a whisper of a name in reference to its origins.   This forceful adoption into surrealism negates Kahlo’s actual contribution to painting. It negates her conscious choices as an artist. It negates Mexico’s ability to produce such an artist of equal standing responding to her time. It not only negates; it also validates the West’s investigation into the primitive.

Kahlo becomes proof that this Western surrealist investigation into the Id/primitive is an unbiased valid pursuit by the West. The desperate stretch to include her in such a dialogue is obvious when one considers Salvador Dali as one of the premier surrealists. Kahlo is Not Dali. Mexicans are not Spaniards. If the goal were truly to unleash the Id/primitive why wouldn’t surrealists look to African art and artists? Dali tried everything outlandish to connect with that Id/primitive by dressing and consuming the exotic. When Dali dresses up, it is a costume. Most of the surrealist artists do not succeed in more than an illustration of the Id/primitive, which in fact is ego, not Id, and sometimes especially in Dali’s work, super-ego. They do not achieve an actual connection to Id. Dali did his best to calculate and present the Id/primitive from a super-ego viewpoint.

Salvador Dali
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/d/dd/The_Persistence_of_Memory.jpg

Kahlo’s paintings are a reflection of an honest narrative. She has a direct relationship with every image and object in her pieces. These objects are not juxtaposed to have psychoanalytical discussions; often times these objects are images that are needed at the moment. Including Kahlo into the canon of surrealism suggests her imagery and objects are random thoughts, playing out a clever Freudian dreamlike state.

Benjamin West the death of general wolfe 1770
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4f/Benjamin_West_005.jpg

The stretch to tie Kahlo’s work to surrealism has more to do with using the indigenous to validate Western academia. It is a continuation of a foundation laid in romanticism’s Death of general wolfe. Benjamin West’s general has an indigenous native placed to witness and give credence to West’s good nature. The native sits beneath in a solemn respect his place not equal to the general slightly lower and of little concern.

When Kahlo is forcefully adopted into a surrealist dialogue, she actually becomes the exotic native in The death of general wolfe. Kahlo placed at the feet of surrealism only to prove its good nature, slightly lower. Once she is placed in the context of surrealism, it prevents a real analysis of her work. Kahlo’s work is honest; surrealists don’t care about honesty.

Christopher Hutchinson is an accomplished Jamaican conceptual artist, professor and contributor to the art community as a writer, critic and founder of the nonprofit Smoke School of Art. He is a Professor of Art at Atlanta Metropolitan State College and has been featured as a lecturer including prestigious engagements at University of Alabama and the Auburn Avenue Research Library. For two decades, Chris has been a practicing artist. His works have been exhibited in internationally recognized institutions including City College New York (CUNY) and featured at the world’s leading international galleries such as Art Basel Miami. He has always had an innate passion for creating spaces where Africans and people of African descent contribute to an inclusive contemporary dialogue—ever evolving, not reflexive but pioneering. This requires challenging the rubric of the canon of art history, a systemic space of exclusion for the Other: women and non-Whites, and where necessary he rewrites it. He received his Master of Fine Arts Degree in Painting from Savannah College of Art & Design, Atlanta and his Bachelor of Arts Degree from the University of Alabama in Huntsville, Alabama.