Master of Letters (with Merit) / The objective of this paper is to examine the self-portrait paintings of Frida Kahlo and to explore the way in which they articulate a ‘self’ and ‘identity’ through creating an innovative feminine vocabulary. The aim of this creative research is to explore the way in which Frida Kahlo represented her sexual subjectivity in the body of self-portraits she produced in her short life time. The self-portraits, some of which were produced in a state of severe physical disability and chronic illness, were also created in the shadow of her famous partner- socialist Mexican muralist/ revolutionary Diego Rivera. An examination of the significant body of self-portrait paintings produced by Frida Kahlo, informed by her personal letters, poems, and photographs, broadens the conventional definitions of subjective self beyond the generic patterns of autobiographical narrative, characteristic of an inherently masculine Western ‘self’. In Kahlo’s self-portraits the representation of the urban Mexican proletarian woman-child draws stylistically from the domain of European self-portraiture, early studio photographic portraiture, and the biographical Mexican Catholic retablo art, with its indebtedness to the ancient Aztec Indian symbology of self.

Master of Letters (with Merit) / The objective of this paper is to examine the self-portrait paintings of Frida Kahlo and to explore the way in which they articulate a ‘self’ and ‘identity’ through creating an innovative feminine vocabulary. The aim of this creative research is to explore the way in which Frida Kahlo represented her sexual subjectivity in the body of self-portraits she produced in her short life time. The self-portraits, some of which were produced in a state of severe physical disability and chronic illness, were also created in the shadow of her famous partner- socialist Mexican muralist/ revolutionary Diego Rivera. An examination of the significant body of self-portrait paintings produced by Frida Kahlo, informed by her personal letters, poems, and photographs, broadens the conventional definitions of subjective self beyond the generic patterns of autobiographical narrative, characteristic of an inherently masculine Western ‘self’. In Kahlo’s self-portraits the representation of the urban Mexican proletarian woman-child draws stylistically from the domain of European self-portraiture, early studio photographic portraiture, and the biographical Mexican Catholic retablo art, with its indebtedness to the ancient Aztec Indian symbology of self.

One of the most stunning works of art on the Scripps College campus is the mural Flower Vendors(1946). The artist,Alfredo Ramos Martínez, an influential figure in Mexican Modernism, executed the work using a variety of traditional and non-traditional techniques. Prior analysis of the work indicated the use of a wax emulsion medium and established the range of pigments used. Ramos Martínez’s use of lead chromate (chrome yellow, Pb(CrO4)) was unusual in wall painting, and the pigment itself has been shown to photodegrade and darken over time in oil paintings, due to the reduction of Cr(VI) to Cr(III). The Pb(CrO4) in Flower Vendorsdoes not appear to have darkened, raising questions about the stability of lead chromate in a wax-emulsion medium relative to that of oil-based mediums. To better understand the behavior of lead chromate in wax-based mediums, a historical synthesis of lead chromate was recreated, and the pigment was suspended in four different binder matrices: a wax-water emulsion, refined linseed oil, cold-pressed linseed oil, and poppy oil. Each of these paint-binder mixtures wasaged beneath full-spectrum 6500 K LED lights. The relative darkening of the pigments was measured using UV-Vis reflectance colorimetry, and comparisons were made between the mediums.