For immediate release
September 23, 2002
Teatro
Milagro Brings Frida, Un Retablo to Brownsville
With her trademark blackbird-wing brow and braided hair, Frida Kahlo was both
artist and Mexican icon, whose many surrealistic images and self-portraits were
a retreat from an existence that included great suffering as well as joy.
The life of this legendary Mexican
painter is presented in a series of visual stories, or retablos, October 9, when
the bilingual Teatro Milagro makes its first visit to Brownsville with “Frida,
Un Retablo.” The production is a
feature of the University of Texas at Brownsville/Texas Southmost College’s
popular Arts and Entertainment series, now in its second year.
A touring company of the Oregon-based Miracle Theater Group, Teatro Milago
is part of one of the largest Hispanic arts and culture organizations in the
Pacific Northwest. Danel Malan directs the production, which includes a series
of snapshots portraying significant moments in the life of this extraordinary
woman.
As young and old versions of the artist mingle with important figures in her
life, the play dramatizes her stormy relationship with the famed muralist Diego
Rivera, the bus accident that led to a lifelong series of surgeries and pain,
her miscarriages, and the teaching that brought her joy before her death in 1954
at the age of 47.
Death, loss and suffering were frequently explored in her art, which debuted in
her first show at the Julien Levy Gallery in New York in 1938. Raucous colors
and unusual spatial relationships reflected the physical and emotional suffering
she experienced in her short life. In over 200 self-portraits and other haunting
images, Kahlo’s work became her life, and her life was reinvented in her art.
Born in Coyoacan, southwest of Mexico City, of European and Mexican parents,
Kahlo often wove symbols and elements of Mexican history into her
self-portraits, in which she frequently appeared in colorful Mexican Indian
costume and accessories.
Interest in Frida Kahlo seems to be high at the moment, with actress Salma Hayek
producing and starring in a film version of the artist’s life. According to
news reports, Hayek’s film pushed out competing productions connected to Madonna
and Jennifer Lopez, and received favorable reviews at the recent Toronto
International Film Festival.
Tickets for the 8 p.m. Wednesday, October 9, performance of “Frida, un retablo”
at the Jacob Brown Auditorium are available by calling the Fort Brown Memorial
Center, 983-7944.