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Intersecting Identities In Kahlo's Life

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Throughout her life, Kahlo had many intersecting identities. As a feminist, bisexual, crossdresser, minority, woman, crip, and activist, she had many forces working against her, yet she did not give up. “To believe that achievement contradicts disability is to pair helplessness with disability, a pairing for which crips pay an awful price...it deprives us the resources to live independently. It physically and sexually abuses us in astoundingly high numbers. It refuses to give us jobs because even when a workplace is accessible, the speech impediment, the limp, the ventilator, the seeing-eye dog are read as signs of inability...” (Clare 8). This quote proves that Kahlo, through her many struggles, was able to rise against the odds and do what she loved. She painted through her disability. She rallied through her pain, she conquered life through her limp, and made an impact due to her work. Throughout her life, Kahlo achieved more than most, not allowing her intersecting identities get in her way. …show more content…

Her work is a mixture of pain and feminism, empowerment of women, and embracing hardships. Out of one hundred and forty-three paintings, fifty-five were self portraits. “I paint myself because I am often alone and I am the subject I know best.” Kahlo claims. Each one is different, yet the same anguish is laid into the paint. This reminds us of the A and Not-A concept. Typically, “In Western society, “man” is A, “women” is Not-A” (Lorber 7). Automatically, Kahlo would have been considered Not-A because she was a woman, but also because she was mexican, bisexual and “impure.” However, society ignored the A/Not-A concept with her because she was one of the most popular 20th century artists’. Society embraced her differences and accepted her Not-A

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