In addition to many letters, Frida Kahlo and Nickolas Muray also exchanged gifts: Kahlo gave Muray several of her works, in some cases to repay Nick for the money he lent her, and in others to leave a memento of her to her lover. Of the many photos Muray gave Frida, one depicting her with a dreamy face is still on display at the Frida Kahlo Museum in Coyoacán, on the wall of Diego Rivera’s bedroom.
In a photograph on display here, Nick immortalises Frida at her easel while painting ‘The Two Fridas’, a self-portrait of her separation from Diego. The painting is one of Frida Kahlo’s most famous and depicts two Fridas, sitting hand in hand, like Siamese twins whose hearts are connected by a single artery. The one on the right wears a typical Mexican costume, while the one on the left a wedding dress. The first Frida is the one who still loves Diego and in fact holds in her hands a miniature of him from which an artery grows and feeds her. The second Frida, on the left, is the one Rivera no longer loves and is slowly bleeding to death, despite the haemostatic scissors that try to stop the loss.
Into this narrative comes Muray who adds a new element, the real Frida who is painting the work. If the picture acts as a puzzle to the viewer, who wonders which of the three Fridas is the real one, the same question will certainly be asked by Muray, unable to decipher Kahlo’s feelings.
During Kahlo’s stay in Paris, Muray sent her $400 to cover some expenses, as she refused to be financially dependent on Rivera. To thank him, Frida gave him the painting ‘What the water gave me’ – shown here in a photographic reproduction made by Muray – which had also just been published in an issue of Minotaure, Breton’s magazine, as well as in the volume Surrealism and Painting, making it one of Kahlo’s most famous works at the time. The painting is a metaphor for what fate had in store for Frida: in a bathtub in which we only see her feet and legs, float the events that marked her existence, from her accident, to her abortion, to her relationship with death and suffering. Somehow the painting was also meant to serve as a warning to Muray, as if to warn him that despite all the love he could give her, Frida’s life would forever be marked by destruction.
Mimi Muray, Nick’s second daughter and now director of the Nickolas Muray Photo Archive, grew up with the constant presence of Frida. Every time she walked into the living room of her home, Kahlo’s painting ‘Self-Portrait with Necklace of Thorns’ was waiting for her. Inspired by the Christian iconography of Christ Pantocrator, Frida had portrayed herself in front of a backdrop of exotic leaves, with a panther and a spider monkey on her shoulders, and a crown of thorns around her neck that penetrated the flesh from which a dead hummingbird dangled.
It was certainly a disturbing presence in a house, but Muray would never have dreamed of parting with the painting, which he had bought from Frida, fresh off the easel, in 1940, the year she divorced Rivera. And while that was the moment when Nick hoped their relationship might have a breakthrough, the painting would always remain a reminder that Frida was never really available to him. Frida was present in the self-portrait but absent at the same time and Muray could only retreat in good order.