Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve Camray.
Speaker 1: It's ready. Are you welcome to stuff you missed in
Speaker 1: history class? From house stuff works dot com. Hello, and
Speaker 1: welcome to the podcast. I'm to bling a chuck rewarding
Speaker 1: and I'm fair. And in two thousand nine, a couple
Speaker 1: of antique dealers from Mexico, Carlos and Laticia Neiola, stirred
Speaker 1: up a big controversy in the art world. They'd for
Speaker 1: some time had in their possession a huge, previously unknown
Speaker 1: trove of material that belonged to renowned twentieth century artists,
Speaker 1: free to Carlo Now, who's probably, of course, considered one
Speaker 1: of the most famous painters ever, certainly one of the
Speaker 1: most iconic painters absolutely, And this trove that they have
Speaker 1: includes paintings, letters, diaries complete with sexually explicit doodles, recipes,
Speaker 1: and other keepsakes. So this trope sounds pretty interesting, but
Speaker 1: the way they came by it is admittedly a little
Speaker 1: bit sketchy. The couple say that they bought it from
Speaker 1: a lawyer who got it from a wood carver who
Speaker 1: worked for Diego Rivera, CALO's husband, and they have a
Speaker 1: letter to the wood carver from Calo, offering the stash
Speaker 1: to him as payment for some work that he'd done,
Speaker 1: And this is kind of one of their one of
Speaker 1: the proofs that they have of it. Initially, nobody really
Speaker 1: paid much attention to the fact that they had this,
Speaker 1: But just when Princeton Architectural Press was about to publish
Speaker 1: a book featuring the fines called Finding Free to Callo
Speaker 1: Free to, experts from all over stepped forward to protest. Yeah.
Speaker 1: According to a article in Newsweek by Jenny Yabrof, twelve
Speaker 1: Calo experts signed this official letter denouncing the new collection,
Speaker 1: and the trust that controls Klo's copyright even filed a
Speaker 1: criminal complaint asking the Mexican government to investigate the fines
Speaker 1: and to ultimately try to block the book's publication. So
Speaker 1: we're gonna be talking a little bit more about how
Speaker 1: this situation has turned out in the second part of
Speaker 1: this two part podcast, but for now, we want to
Speaker 1: consider why are so many people convinced that the material
Speaker 1: is fake in the first place, especially since scientific testing
Speaker 1: has dated it to Kala's lifetime and a handwriting expert
Speaker 1: says that the writing in the letters does match kolos
Speaker 1: so Yabrov's article goes a little bit into the process
Speaker 1: of art authentication, which is really interesting, and she discusses
Speaker 1: how experts will often base their opinions regarding the works
Speaker 1: authenticity on whether it feels like something the artists would do, or,
Speaker 1: in the case of letters, whether it just sounds like
Speaker 1: something here. She would say, so, that sounds pretty inexact,
Speaker 1: but at least in Colo's case, there might be something
Speaker 1: to these sort of touchy feely verdicts because her works
Speaker 1: are so much about her. I mean, of about a
Speaker 1: hundred and forty three authenticated paintings, fifty five of those
Speaker 1: or self portraits. So, of course all of this attention
Speaker 1: is also partly because Frieda's work is just so high
Speaker 1: they acclaimed, and she's even developed kind of a cult
Speaker 1: following over the past couple of decades. Freedom maniacs, as
Speaker 1: Stephanie Mensmer calls Calo fans, and an article for The
Speaker 1: Washington Monthly seemed to be at least as interested in
Speaker 1: Kolo's life story as they are in her art. You
Speaker 1: know all the details and interesting facts about her. In fact,
Speaker 1: Mensimers suggests that this is why die hard feminists don't
Speaker 1: really celebrate Kolo that much, which I find to be
Speaker 1: really interesting. And it's because some of her feel some
Speaker 1: of them feel that her fame isn't really related to
Speaker 1: her work. So in this episode, we want to take
Speaker 1: a look at that life story that so many people
Speaker 1: are drawn to. It's one that involves politics and even
Speaker 1: a touch of glamour and a tumultuous love story. After
Speaker 1: we did the Brownings episode, a lot of people were
Speaker 1: requesting more love. Yes, so here it is. And um
Speaker 1: probably the part that touches people the most just Freeda's
Speaker 1: pain and suffering. It's a major part of her personality.
Speaker 1: So pain was something that Frieda Callo learned about pretty
Speaker 1: early on, even though she started out in a fairly
Speaker 1: happy situation. She was born Magdalena Carmen Frieda calo E
Speaker 1: Calderon on July six, nineteen o seven, and she was
Speaker 1: the third of four daughters, so she came from a
Speaker 1: mixed ancestry, to which must have made her stand out
Speaker 1: a little bit growing up. Yeah, her father was Guier
Speaker 1: Moo Callo, a German jew who had immigrated to Mexico
Speaker 1: in eighteen ninety one, and her mother was Matilda Calderon,
Speaker 1: a Mexican Catholic whose heritage was a mix of both
Speaker 1: Indian and Spanish, and according to an article by Phillis
Speaker 1: Tukman in The Smithsonian, Frieda's father really just adored her.
Speaker 1: She was his favorite of all his daughters, and he
Speaker 1: found her to be very smart and very much like him,
Speaker 1: and she doated on him in return. And her relationship
Speaker 1: with her mother, though was a little bit more contentious.
Speaker 1: Frieda seemed to admire her mom. She thought that she
Speaker 1: was smart, but sometimes she thought that her mom could
Speaker 1: be a little too fanatically religious and also cruel free
Speaker 1: to herself though, was a fairly obedient child, but she
Speaker 1: did have quite the quick temper, so the Calo called
Speaker 1: her own. Family lived in a house known as Casa
Speaker 1: Azul or Blue House, which her father had built in
Speaker 1: Koya Khan, an area outside of Mexico City. And it's
Speaker 1: significant to know this because it's a place that Frieda
Speaker 1: would come back to throughout her life. So she had
Speaker 1: her first real experience with adversity at only aged six,
Speaker 1: when she contracted polio. We've of course done an episode
Speaker 1: on that, so you can, you know, get a better
Speaker 1: picture of what that would have been like for her
Speaker 1: and her family by listening to that old episode. Frieda
Speaker 1: of course survived, but after her bout with polio, her
Speaker 1: right leg was thinner than her left and her right
Speaker 1: foot was also stunted. But she really didn't let that
Speaker 1: beat her, didn't let it stop her in any way. No,
Speaker 1: she didn't. She maybe to prove that her disabilities couldn't
Speaker 1: keep her down. She became a total tomboy. She played
Speaker 1: sports such as soccer, She did boxing, wrestling, swimming, and
Speaker 1: she would run around with the boys from her school
Speaker 1: instead of learning to clean and cook at home like
Speaker 1: the other girls might have been doing. She was also
Speaker 1: exposed to art pretty early on. Her father was a photographer,
Speaker 1: and he taught her some of the tricks of his trade,
Speaker 1: including how to retouch photos, and Frieda also took drawing
Speaker 1: lessons from one of her father's pals when she was
Speaker 1: growing up. So when she was fifteen years old, she
Speaker 1: started at the elite National Preparatory School in Mexico City,
Speaker 1: and at that time she was really one of only
Speaker 1: a few females studying there. And he might, of course
Speaker 1: expect free to college to have been studying art or
Speaker 1: something like that. But she was taking science courses like
Speaker 1: anatomy and biology because her ultimate goal was to become
Speaker 1: a doctor. And of course the things she learned in
Speaker 1: these classes, you know, anatomy and biology, might have really
Speaker 1: informed her artwork later on and made her pieces more
Speaker 1: realistic when it came to human anatomy, that sort of thing.
Speaker 1: She was at school when she met d a. Go Rivera,
Speaker 1: a man who, as we mentioned, plays a major role
Speaker 1: later on in her life story. Now Rivera, just to
Speaker 1: give you a little bit of quick background on him.
Speaker 1: He was a Mexican born also Mexican born like Frieda,
Speaker 1: and about twenty years her senior. He started drawing and
Speaker 1: studying art at an early age, and by nineteen oh
Speaker 1: seven he'd moved to Europe to study the great masters
Speaker 1: like Gogan and Matisset, but he was still searching for
Speaker 1: something new, a different style of painting that would allow
Speaker 1: him to reach a wide audience and really express his
Speaker 1: take on what was going on in the world. So
Speaker 1: he returned to Mexico and by nineteen twenty one he
Speaker 1: was painting a series of public murals as part of
Speaker 1: a government program, and these murals reflected his thoughts about
Speaker 1: Mexico and its history and its people. And that's what
Speaker 1: he was doing when he met Frieda for the first time.
Speaker 1: He was painting, painting a mural in her school's auditorium,
Speaker 1: and apparently Colo would play pranks on him while he
Speaker 1: was working, things like stealing his lunch, and she would
Speaker 1: put soap on the steps next to where he was working.
Speaker 1: And you just think of them as this dignified adult cover.
Speaker 1: It's hard to imagine these childish pranks of hers. But
Speaker 1: she was supposedly known for having this great sense of
Speaker 1: humor and for being quite the trickster. So according to
Speaker 1: Tukman's article in Rivera's autobiography, he recalls seeing Frieda for
Speaker 1: the first time when he was painting one night. He said, quote,
Speaker 1: all of a sudden, the door flew open, and a
Speaker 1: girl who seemed to be no more than ten or
Speaker 1: twelve was propelled inside. She had unusual dignity and self assurance,
Speaker 1: and there was a strange fire in her eyes. So
Speaker 1: apparently this older, worldly muralist actually noticed Frieda, even though
Speaker 1: she was only sixteen at the time. But as far
Speaker 1: as we can tell, nothing really happened between them. They
Speaker 1: didn't get to know each other at this point, so
Speaker 1: Frieda really seemed to be caught up in her studies
Speaker 1: and her friends. And she had a boyfriend tu named
Speaker 1: Alejandro Gomez Arias. And in nine one of the major
Speaker 1: events of her life happens, and she's actually with her boyfriend.
Speaker 1: When it happened, she was eighteen years old and they
Speaker 1: were riding home from school one day when a trolley
Speaker 1: car crashed into their bus, and in the accident, a
Speaker 1: metal handraill broke off and stabbed Frieda's body, basically going
Speaker 1: into her abdomen and exiting through her vagina. When it
Speaker 1: was all said and done, her spinal column was broken
Speaker 1: in three places, her collar bone, some ribs, and her
Speaker 1: pelvis were all broken, and then her right leg, the
Speaker 1: one that had already been affected by polio, was broken
Speaker 1: in eleven places. Her right foot was dislocated and crashed,
Speaker 1: and a lot of people died in this crash. I mean,
Speaker 1: you can imagine if her injuries were that bad, and
Speaker 1: initially doctors thought that Frieda wouldn't survive either. She had
Speaker 1: an operation, she was in the hospital for about a
Speaker 1: month and then finally she got to go home, but
Speaker 1: her recovery process after that was still a long long
Speaker 1: time and quite painful to it was not at all
Speaker 1: comfortable at lessoned for months, and she had to spend
Speaker 1: the whole time encased in these plaster courses, basically like
Speaker 1: a body cast. Obviously, she couldn't go back to school
Speaker 1: while she was in that state, so that is when
Speaker 1: she started painting. The way she described it, she started
Speaker 1: painting quote without giving it any particular thought. It was
Speaker 1: just sort of something for her to do to pass
Speaker 1: the time. And she basically taught herself. I mean she did,
Speaker 1: as we mentioned wed, she'd had those drawing lessons and everything,
Speaker 1: but this was kind of her foray into painting, and
Speaker 1: she did it from her sick bed. Her mom had
Speaker 1: a special easel rigged up for her and had a
Speaker 1: mirror attached to the underside of her beds canopy. And
Speaker 1: so that's how her self portraits started. And of course
Speaker 1: Frieda hadn't been to Europe to practice art and to
Speaker 1: study the masters as Rivera had, but she must have
Speaker 1: had some knowledge of them because she would incorporate little
Speaker 1: bits of their styles into her own paintings. Again, according
Speaker 1: to Tukman's article, she gave her boyfriend a painting of
Speaker 1: herself that showed her with a swan like neck and
Speaker 1: tapered fingers, and she called it your bought of Chili.
Speaker 1: It's really easy to imagine her in bed, staring at
Speaker 1: this mirror all day, every day for months and trying
Speaker 1: to heal. And it's also easy to imagine that that
Speaker 1: would lead to a lot of introspection. And it seemed
Speaker 1: that during this time, Frieda really started to see herself differently,
Speaker 1: or at least noticed some fundamental changes about herself. She
Speaker 1: wrote in a letter quote, I was a child who
Speaker 1: went about in a world of colors. My friends, my
Speaker 1: companions became women. Slowly I became old in instance. And
Speaker 1: maybe it was partially a result of seeing this change
Speaker 1: in herself. But as she recovered, Frieda, who had always
Speaker 1: had sort of a leftist streak, began to get more
Speaker 1: interested in Mexican politics. She struck up a friendship with
Speaker 1: Tina Bedotti, an Italian photographer who was a member of
Speaker 1: the Communist Party, and she ended up joining the Communist
Speaker 1: Party herself. According to PBS, freed To actually started telling
Speaker 1: people that her birthday was July six, nineteen ten, rather
Speaker 1: than ninet seven, So that's why you might see some
Speaker 1: discrepancies in her birthday if you're researching her on your own.
Speaker 1: And she probably chose that year because it coincided with
Speaker 1: the outbreak of the Mexican Revolution, so you can see
Speaker 1: how much she how ardent she was about her political beliefs,
Speaker 1: and how much she kind of internalized those. So of
Speaker 1: course Frieda's entrance into the political world also reformed some
Speaker 1: old connections. So an acquaintance from Frieda's past also happened
Speaker 1: to be Communist, and that was of course the muralist Rivera,
Speaker 1: and that was sort of what his working with murals
Speaker 1: was all about in the first place. It was a
Speaker 1: rejection of elite diesel art and fancy galleries and museums
Speaker 1: and the paintings that rich people would have in their
Speaker 1: homes that weren't as accessible for everyday people. You know,
Speaker 1: you have a mural in a public building, anybody can
Speaker 1: see it. And um Rivera also became a leading proponent
Speaker 1: of a post revolution nary movement called the Mexican and Dad,
Speaker 1: which rejected Western European influences seen among the aristocracy for
Speaker 1: all things considered authentically Mexican. So kind of like air
Speaker 1: quotes there and then running in the same political circles.
Speaker 1: Perhaps it was only inevitable that Rivera and Frieda would
Speaker 1: of course cross paths again, especially if she had made
Speaker 1: such an impression on him the first go round. And
Speaker 1: this meeting or re meeting probably happened at a party
Speaker 1: given by Frida's friend Medoti, who we mentioned in Night.
Speaker 1: This time, though, when Rivera and Freedom met, the two
Speaker 1: did start up a romantic relationship. By all accounts, they
Speaker 1: were truly the odd couple, at least as far as
Speaker 1: their appearances were concerned. He was six ft tall and
Speaker 1: three hundred pounds and really kind of awkward looking, and
Speaker 1: she was ninety eight pounds and five ft three, so
Speaker 1: very small and also considered quite pretty. And we've already
Speaker 1: mentioned the twenty one year age difference between them, so
Speaker 1: that was a big thing too. Even more if you
Speaker 1: go off of Frieda's fake birthday, Yeah, that's true that
Speaker 1: her fake age would have put them further apart. But
Speaker 1: when Rivera started courting Frieda, she was still living at
Speaker 1: her parents house, Casa Zul, and so he'd stopped by
Speaker 1: under the ruse of critiquing her paintings. After all, he
Speaker 1: was by this time, the most celebrated artist in Mexico
Speaker 1: and she was still unknown, so it would make sense
Speaker 1: that she would want his opinion and tips maybe on
Speaker 1: her art. Their friends and family were skeptical of their relationship,
Speaker 1: but it wouldn't take long before Frieda would roll pretty
Speaker 1: much head on into what she described as the second
Speaker 1: accident of her life, which was her marriage to Rivera.
Speaker 1: So that is it for this part of the podcast
Speaker 1: on Frieda Callo. But next time we're gonna give you
Speaker 1: a little bit more on this accident number two that
Speaker 1: we just mentioned, Diego and Frieda's travels into America, their
Speaker 1: tumultuous love, and of course Frieda's art. We're going to
Speaker 1: talk a little bit more about those portraits we've been
Speaker 1: mentioning those eyebrows. I'm sure you all want to go
Speaker 1: and talking about the eyebrows, yes, And we'll also talk
Speaker 1: more about the controversy of the recent free to call
Speaker 1: of fines. So with that, I think we will go
Speaker 1: ahead and move on to listener mail. Well, we haven't
Speaker 1: done too much listener mail in a while, so I
Speaker 1: think we're going to read a few emails this time
Speaker 1: to make up for it. The first one is from
Speaker 1: listener Jill, and she says, hello, ladies. I just made
Speaker 1: a trip to Mammoth Cave National Park in Kentucky. On
Speaker 1: the historic tour, visitors get to see booths Amphitheater, which
Speaker 1: is a large platform close to the top of the
Speaker 1: cave that looks out over a huge open part of
Speaker 1: the tunnel. The ranger recounted how the actor Edwin Booth
Speaker 1: once performed Hamlet from the platform to large crowds below.
Speaker 1: He also told the story of how one Booth killed
Speaker 1: the Lincoln and another save to Lincoln. Coincidentally, I listened
Speaker 1: to the Booth Conspiracy episode on the way home from
Speaker 1: the trip, which is so cool. I love the idea
Speaker 1: of getting to see Booth at Mammoth Cave for forming
Speaker 1: his signature role of Hamlet. Imagine when he picks up
Speaker 1: the skull or something from a cave. For been there
Speaker 1: but I haven't either, but it sounds like a cool
Speaker 1: place to see a play. Actually, so, we got a
Speaker 1: lot of mail about the Booth Conspiracy episode. Actually I
Speaker 1: kind of figured we did. We would get a lot
Speaker 1: of mail because there are so many Lincoln fans out there.
Speaker 1: But I wanted to share one interesting point that a
Speaker 1: listener Patrick wrote in to share with us. He said
Speaker 1: Booth wanted to kill General Grant, as you may know,
Speaker 1: but as everyone knows, he did not attend the play
Speaker 1: or Booth did not come up with a plan for
Speaker 1: the event. Uh. The interesting reason why why then rants
Speaker 1: did not attend is that Julia Dent wanted to see
Speaker 1: her children and leave Washington as soon as possible that afternoon,
Speaker 1: and that's what Grant told Lincoln. But more interestingly, many
Speaker 1: believed Julia did not care for Mary Todd Lincoln and
Speaker 1: did not want to attend the play with her. I
Speaker 1: kind of had wondered about that. They went through a
Speaker 1: few theater guest invitations before where they finally settled on
Speaker 1: their port engaged couple. Um, and it seems like, you know,
Speaker 1: people would be happened to go to a play with Lincoln.
Speaker 1: I would jump the chance to go to a play
Speaker 1: with the President and his wife. Yeah, I mean it
Speaker 1: sounds like a sounds like it would be an opportunity
Speaker 1: of a lifetime, although clearly things didn't go as planned.
Speaker 1: Now we're going to switch gears just a little bit
Speaker 1: and getting our way back machine because we have a
Speaker 1: listener mail here a very recent one from last week,
Speaker 1: but it is about an episode that we did a
Speaker 1: year ago on Paul Morphy, Chess Champion. And it's from
Speaker 1: Sarah in New Orleans, and she says, I'm a longtime listener,
Speaker 1: first time writer, inner, and a local TV producer here
Speaker 1: in New Orleans. When y'all did your Paul Morphy podcast
Speaker 1: back in June, I was completely surprised and delighted to
Speaker 1: hear that arguably the greatest chess player in the whole
Speaker 1: world hailed from right here in New Orleans. Anyway, y'all
Speaker 1: inspired me to do a short package for our five
Speaker 1: PM news about Paul Morphy. I figured that a lot
Speaker 1: of New Orleaning is, like myself, had no idea who
Speaker 1: he was, and I wanted to spread the word. In
Speaker 1: doing the research, I discovered lots of cool things about
Speaker 1: Paul Morphy and things that maybe y'all didn't get to mention.
Speaker 1: The way I see it, he was kind of the
Speaker 1: forest scump of the nineteenth century New Orleans, being that
Speaker 1: he managed to cross paths with more than a few
Speaker 1: major historical people in icons. For example, he was born
Speaker 1: in the house that PGT. Beauregard, a major general of
Speaker 1: the Civil War Confederacy later lived in. At nine, he
Speaker 1: defeated Winfield Scott at chess three times in a row,
Speaker 1: and later he lived in and died in the house
Speaker 1: that is now Brennan's restaurant, arguably the most famous and
Speaker 1: iconic restaurant in New Orleans. And she sent us a link.
Speaker 1: Maybe we'll post it on Facebook or something so you
Speaker 1: guys can check out her package that she put together.
Speaker 1: It's two minutes long. And um, thanks for writing and Sarah,
Speaker 1: it's really cool to know that are telling this story
Speaker 1: inspired other people to tell this story. Yeah, I liked
Speaker 1: her segment to it featured a chess teacher in New
Speaker 1: Orleans and a couple of boys who were who are
Speaker 1: learning the art of chess, just like pal Morphy would
Speaker 1: have um many many years ago. And she said she
Speaker 1: might learn to play chess from that chess teacher that
Speaker 1: she interviewed, same aspiration after we did the Palm Morphy
Speaker 1: episode that it didn't quite play out. Yeah, playing chests
Speaker 1: for me is like knitting. It's one of those things
Speaker 1: that I learned to do. I've learned to do multiple
Speaker 1: times over the course of my lifetime that continue to
Speaker 1: drop it. Yes, exactly. It's a phase that I get
Speaker 1: into for a couple of weeks and then I fall
Speaker 1: out of it, So maybe I'll take it up again someday.
Speaker 1: So thank you all for writing in sharing so much
Speaker 1: stuff about the Lincoln assassination. And yeah, you can always
Speaker 1: email us about really old episodes too. We like to
Speaker 1: hear things like you've produced a news segment based on
Speaker 1: a podcast. That's pretty cool. So we are at History
Speaker 1: Podcast at Discovery dot com. We're also on Twitter at
Speaker 1: missed in History, and we are on Facebook. And if
Speaker 1: you get inspired in the meantime before part you off,
Speaker 1: the free to CALLO episode comes along. To learn a
Speaker 1: little bit more about famous artists. We have a whole
Speaker 1: slew of articles about famous artists on our website, I
Speaker 1: mean Picasso, Jackson, Pollock, Sally even freed To and you
Speaker 1: can look them up by visiting our homepage at www
Speaker 1: dot House to works dot com. Be sure to check
Speaker 1: out our new video podcast, Stuff from the Future. Join
Speaker 1: House to Work staff as we explore the most promising
Speaker 1: and perplexing possibilities of tomorrow. The House top Works iPhone
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