For those of you who are unfamiliar with Ms. Kahlo and Mr. Rivera, let's just say their relationship was non-traditional. Diego was incapable of fidelity and had numerous affairs with every glamorous woman from Mexico City to New York, including Frida’s sister, Cristina. It should be said that I don’t think this makes him a bad person. He was honest about needing extramarital sex and I personally believe some people are not built for monogamy. Besides, Frida had affairs of her own with people like Leon Trotsky and Georgia O’Keefe. What’s interesting about this whole predicament is that Diego’s affairs broke Frida’s heart over and over and over again and yet she maintained that she could not love Diego for what he’s not. Of all the things Frida has taught me, this is the one lesson that has helped me the most. You have to love people for exactly what they are. You can’t say, “I love you but you have to change your clothes/taste in music/mother.” You have to love everything about them, even the stuff you don’t like. It’s all about what you’re willing to put up with. Either you can love someone despite his or her flaws or you can’t. Frida loved Diego more than anything in this universe. In a letter to him she wrote:
“I love you more than my own skin”
But the interesting thing is how Diego died. Look it up anywhere and sources will say his cause of death was cardiac arrest or heart failure, but that’s a cop out. Everybody dies of heart failure. I’m no medical expert but I’m pretty sure it’s a univeral truth that your heart arrests, then fails, then you die. SO the real question is how did Diego die?
Any guesses?
It wasn’t a heart attack from working too hard (or f*cking too hard)
It wasn’t diabetes caused by his obesity
It was…
Cancer
Of
The
PENIS! You have no idea how hard I laughed at this. I know it’s not particularly graceful to laugh about someone’s death, but it is HILARIOUS. His death certificate might as well read “killed by irony.” How do I know all this you ask? I watched a youtube video of a lecture Hayden Herrera, the most well respected Frida biographer, gave in 2009 and she mentions it toward the end. I highly recommend that you watch this lecture. Even if you think you know everything about Frida (like moi), you’ll hear some things you haven’t heard before.
But yes, cancer of the penis is how Mr. Rivera died. Apparently the doctors wanted to amputate his penis but he wouldn’t let them. He went to Russia for crazy radiation treatments instead which made him even sicker. Yep. Gooood moooorning!
Here’s the link:
Common knowledge. My Mexican art history teacher mentioned it in the 90s.
ReplyDeletesmart arse
DeleteHA! Frida would have died again laughing! This wan't common knowledge to me but then I'm not a know-it-all, millennial ;)
ReplyDeleteAlthough the way Diego Rivera died may seem ironic, having cancer and/or succumbing to congestive heart failure is nothing to be laughing at or about, for any person with "knowledge", -- 'common', or otherwise. For the sake of kindness, I would apologize to all readers, Diego and Frida's families, all of Mexico, and the Art World itself for the inconsiderate commentary above. Afterall, aren't we speaking about two of the world's most renowned artists; one being the fourth most recognized fresco painter of all time, right behind Michaelangelo, Davinci, and Raphael?
ReplyDeleteIt’s still ironic. So was leather face. You supposed to admire him ?
DeleteI believe that Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo truly loved each other; far beyond the details of their sexual relationship. After 1943, when both artists were elected to Mexico's newly formed “Colegio Nacional”, to include the most outstanding scientists, writers, artists, musicians, and intellectuals (i.e. Raphael’s School of Athens). Frida's health began to fail, and she was in great pain in her daily life. Diego did his best to take care of Frida, and to offer her comfort and support, to offset her suicidal thoughts. Stalin, and Russian Communism were exposed as brutal failures. Money was a large and constant concern, and in this very difficult environment, a depressed Diego had to produce a lot of 'popular' paintings, just to stave off Frida's medical bills. (Many of these are still being discovered, even 60+ years later...). He kept trying to 'save' Frida, from her pain, and anguish. When Frida died in July of 1954, - Diego was emotionally devastated. Within a year, it was discovered he had cancer. Then, the Soviet cobalt treatments and his hope for an earthly cure, failed him. What's more, art critics who had once been friends, such as Selden Rodman -- had begun to question the 'scale', and the 'taste' -- even the very 'passion' of his work, so even his fine artistic legacy was put at stake. Finally, after suffering out of his mind over Frida, and being confronted with fears of his own mortality (the cancer grew worse, and he had begun to lose the use of his right hand to Plebitis), and what legacy he would leave... Diego tried to pull the wagons into a circle, and prepare for his trip 'home'.
ReplyDeleteHe left his Art, his residence, and Pre-Columbian collection of artifacts to the Mexican people; sold at less than cost to a trusted friend (Dorothy Olmeda), the remainder of Frida's work for a promise of kindness, ...'til the end. Always an intense scholar, Diego re-read his Plato and Aristotle to re-stabilize his artistic perspective, studied the paintings/Art of his most popular and respected peers Impressionist/Postimpressionist/Cubist (Cezanne, Van Gogh, Gauguin, Monet, Renoir, Picasso) trying to place himself in their company in regards to the historical question of Truth or Beauty. He saw his body of works snugly taking up the entire breadth between Cezanne's truth, all the way to Renoir's beauty... the greater part of his success owing to the former, before a final celebration or epiphany in the latter. He read profusely the literary works of Saint Teresa, and Dorothy Day, to put his own spiritual self in order (finally adjusted the "Dios no Existe" mural at the Hotel Del Prado, and 2 days later announced that he was "a Catholic"); worked on a series of sunsets. Nearing the end and unable to climb up onto the scaffolds any longer to produce his fabulous murals of social realism, Diego painted some symbolic oil paintings on canvas, and one final autobiographical masterpiece (A church with no cross , much like Van Gogh's Church at Auvers, completed left-handed). As he was a self-proclaimed communist, or 'leftist' -- How's that for irony?
(Note: Although for most of his life he also proclaimed to be an atheist, at the end he proved himself more a 'Catholic Worker', instead (i.e. please read Dorothy Day, from Union Square to Rome, and Saint Teresa of Avila's mystical Interior Castle)-- akin to 96% of his Mexican countrymen. Diego believed in God, the power of the Virgin of Guadalupe, and the teachings of Jesus Christ-- however, religion for him was a communion with Art and Nature, more so than any adherence to the administration of the Catholic Church. - And Peace (Picaso's Doves) be with you.
This is fascinating. Do you have a source for this information?
DeleteThanks
My Mexican art history told us about it in the 90s. You'll probably find it in any biography.
DeleteIt is not a common cancer: less that one percent of American men get it. The rates are higher in some other parts of the world.
Huh?...
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately karma is not very forgiving. Laughing at someone's cause of death makes you seem petty. What do you get from his cause of death? Poetic justice? It's not yours to claim.
ReplyDeleteNothing laughable about it. Many people get cervical cancer, penile cancer, and throat or anal cancer. I am not a doctor but I am told they are caused by the same few viruses usually.
ReplyDeleteThere is a vaccine now for the four most dangerous human papilloma viruses.
lol
ReplyDelete