Kahlo: Self-Portrait with Cropped Hair

An accessible and in-depth study of Frida Kahlo, one of the most beloved artists in MoMA's collection.

Though the Surrealists adopted Frida Kahlo as one of their own, the painter maintained that she did "not know if my paintings are Surrealist or not, but I do know that they are the most frank expression of myself." She produced numerous self-portraits, each one an articulation of different facets of herself and her eventful life.

In Kahlo: Self-Portrait with Cropped Hair, Kahlo painted in the wake of a particularly tumultuous time, just months after she divorced her famous husband, Mexican Muralist painter Diego Rivera. He had always admired her long, dark hair, which, as she indicates in the tresses littering the painting, she had cut off after their split. She also shows herself in an oversized suit resembling the ones that Rivera wore.

Through such emotionally and symbolically charged details, Kahlo expresses her feelings about her relationship with Rivera while also asserting her sense of self as an independent artist.