Rare, Intimate Photos of Frida Kahlo in Love, in Pain and with her Pets

Recently, the New York Botanical Gardens recreated parts of the extensive tropical gardens from Frida Kahlo’s famous “Casa Azul” home in Mexico. It’s the first solo NYC presentation of her work in 25 years, and fans are thrilled to see her art in such an immersive, lush setting. In conjunction with the show, Throckmorton Fine Art is showing a rare collection of photos from Frida until September 12th, many of which are set in the beautiful the gardens of the Blue House.

Though many of the photos appear to be candid snapshots, the images are textured with story. For example, Frida’s hand-painted “plaster bodice”—a cast she wore after one of her many surgeries—contains the hammer and sickle (a pretty explicit nod to her belief in revolutionary communism), but below that is a fetal image, a tragic reference to her failed attempt to have a child due to the bus accident in her youth that left her in constant pain. There are sweeter moments too. While her tumultuous relationship with her husband Diego Rivera produced some warm moments in front of the camera, it is with her many pets that you see Frida at her most gentle and caring.

Frida wearing plaster corset, which she decorated with hammer and sickle (and unborn baby), Coyoacán, 1951

Frida with Michoacán Gourd on head, 1933

Frida winking, 1933

Frida with Caimito de Guayabal, 1943

Frida in Chinese pajamas, 1948

Frida and Diego, Mexico, ca. 1935

Frida in San Francisco, ca. 1940

Frida braiding Rosa Covarrubias’s hair, 1938

Frida on the rooftop, New York, 1946

Firda with her deer, 1940