Henry Ford Hospital (painting)

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Henry Ford Hospital
The Lost Desire, The Flying Bed
Frida Kahlo painting Henry Ford Hospital 1932.jpeg
Artist Frida Kahlo
Year1932 (1932)
MediumOil on metal
Dimensions30.5 cm× 38 cm(12.0 in× 15 in)
Location Dolores Olmedo Museum, Xochimilco, Mexico City

Henry Ford Hospital is a 1932 oil-on-metal painting by the Mexican artist Frida Kahlo about her experience of delivering a dead male fetus on 4 July at Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit, Michigan, United States, when she was approximately 31⁄2 months pregnant. Depictions of childbirth, abortion, or miscarriage are rare in the canon of Western painting, [1] and Kahlo is "one of the only major artists to directly communicate her reproductive grief through visual art." [2] The "bloody and terrifying" [3] painting opened a defining and influential era of Kahlo's career. [4] The painting's first title was The Lost Desire. [5] An alternate title is The Flying Bed [6] (La Cama Volando [7] ).

Contents

Pregnancy and loss

Frida Kahlo had a complicated obstetric/gynecological medical history. [8] Her pelvis had been broken and her vagina was pierced by a metal bar in a catastrophic traffic accident, [9] and she likely had uterine scarring. [10] She had post-polio symptoms; her father had epilepsy, which she was apparently concerned would be a genetic trait passed on to her children; [3] she was plagued with chronic back pain and assorted infections; and by all accounts she desperately wanted to have a baby fathered by her husband, the muralist Diego Rivera. [4] [9]

Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera ~ 1932 Diego riveraa.jpg
Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera ~ 1932

Kahlo was 24 years old at the time of her summer 1932 pregnancy. Per Kahlo's biographer Hayden Herrera, on 26 May she wrote her friend and advisor Dr. Leo Eloesser that she was two months pregnant and had first gone to see Dr. Pratt at Henry Ford Hospital approximately a week prior. In the letter she itemized her doubts about her ability to deliver a healthy child, challenges with her schedule, her lack of family support, and Rivera's inability to parent. [3] (Kahlo considered Rivera to be an infant of sorts, [11] and painted him as such on at least one occasion.) [9] [4] Dr. Pratt gave Kahlo castor oil (a purgative known to induce uterine contractions) and quinine, which together was a formula for inducing miscarriage, i.e., a medical abortion. [12] After approximately six days of mild spotting, she returned to Dr. Pratt. He told her she was still pregnant, that he thought she could and should stay pregnant, and that a Caesarean delivery was possible and would solve the problems that she foresaw with her pregnancy. Kahlo had written Dr. Eloesser about her ambivalence, seeking his direction about whether or not to pursue a surgical abortion (presumably dilation and curettage or dilation and evacuation). But after she sent the first letter, per Herrera, "Frida had decided against [a surgical] abortion, hoping against hope that Dr. Pratt was right." [3]

The artist Lucienne Bloch, who was living with Rivera and Kahlo in Detroit, reported that by the end of June, Kahlo was spotting (early pregnancy bleeding), cramping, and nauseated, but also refusing to return to Dr. Pratt. By the night of 4 July, Kahlo was in severe pain and bleeding heavily. Rivera called for an ambulance on the morning of 5 July. In her diary, Bloch described Kahlo as being taken away by the doctor in "the agonies of birth...out of the pool of blood she had made...the huge clots of blood she kept losing." [3]

Per another letter from Kahlo to Eloesser, the fetus "did not take form since it came out all disintegrated." [3] This language suggests a non-viable pregnancy [13] and subsequent decomposition. [12] Kahlo remained in the hospital until 17 July. [3] Whether the experience depicted in both Henry Ford Hospital and a related untitled lithograph [14] should be characterized as an abortion or a miscarriage remains a topic of contention in art scholarship. [15]

Picture

In this surrealist self-portrait the artist lies in a floating hospital bed surrounded by blood and totems representing her experience and emotions. Foremost amongst these symbols is the fetus itself, centered and central. While she was still in the hospital, Kahlo asked for medical illustrations that described her fetus and the human biology of pregnancy loss, but the doctors refused her request. Instead, Diego Rivera got her human anatomy textbooks. [3] Obstetricians have described Kahlo's depictions of female anatomy and reproductive experiences as "strikingly accurate and incredibly detailed." [12]

In the painting, Kahlo depicts herself naked, breasts and pubic hair exposed, openly weeping. She is tethered by red threads to a teaching model of female reproductive anatomy, a snail ("a private allusive reference" [1] ), a piece of steel-gray medical equipment (possibly an autoclave [12] ), a purple orchid, and a human pelvis bone. The tether to the fetus lacks a bow and may be an umbilical cord, an image that appears elsewhere in Kahlo's oeuvre. [1] [16] The fetus has male genitalia and translucent eyelids, and appears to be about 33 weeks gestation. [12] The orchid, a lavender cattleya, [17] was a gift from Diego Rivera. [12] This painting is the only image of an orchid in her artwork. [18]

A horizon line cuts through the background of the painting, in the distance is Ford's River Rouge complex. [19] Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo had come to Detroit because Edsel Ford [20] had commissioned the Detroit Industry murals for the Detroit Institute of Arts. [11]

Henry Ford Hospital is one of several Kahlo artworks that include simultaneously medically accurate and surrealist images of reproduction; her painting My Birth (1932) is another major example. [12]

Influence

The field of medical humanities has found value in examining Henry Ford Hospital and Kahlo's other obstetric artworks. [21] Kahlo's perspective on motherhood and femininity has also been examined in light of this painting. [7] [22]

See also

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References

  1. 1 2 3 Lomas, D.; Howell, R. (December 1989). "Medical imagery in the art of Frida Kahlo". BMJ (Clinical Research Ed.). 299 (6715): 1584–1587. doi:10.1136/bmj.299.6715.1584. ISSN   0959-8138. PMC   1838787 . PMID   2514924.
  2. ↑ n.a. (28 July 2010). "Pregnancy Loss and Visual Expressions of Grief: An Examination of Frida Kahlo". Academics (goshen.edu). Retrieved 2023-04-11.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Herrera, Hayden (1983). "Chapter 10. Detroit: Henry Ford Hospital". Frida, a biography of Frida Kahlo. Harper & Row (First ed.). New York. ISBN   0-06-011843-1. OCLC   8281462.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
  4. 1 2 3 Tuchman, Phyllis (November 2002). "Frida Kahlo. (cover story)". Smithsonian Magazine. 33 (8): 50.
  5. ↑ Lindauer, Margaret A. (1999). Devouring Frida : the art history and popular celebrity of Frida Kahlo. Frida Kahlo. Hanover, N.H.: University Press of New England. pp. 25 (Lost Desire). ISBN   0-585-37092-3. OCLC   48140053.
  6. ↑ Kettenmann, Andrea; Kahlo, Frida (2003). Frida Kahlo, 1907-1954: Pain and Passion. Taschen. p. 37. ISBN   978-3-8228-5983-4.
  7. 1 2 Marcondes, Ciro Inácio; De Moraes, Vanessa Daniele (25 August 2017). "O imaginário da maternidade em Frida Kahlo" [Images of maternity in Frida Kahlo]. Intexto (in Spanish) (40): 114–132. doi: 10.19132/1807-8583201740.114-132 . ISSN   1807-8583.
  8. ↑ Espinoza, Javier (11 August 2007). "Frida Kahlo's last secret finally revealed". The Guardian . Retrieved 2023-04-10.
  9. 1 2 3 Collins, Amy Fine (4 September 2013). "Frida Kahlo's Diary: A Glimpse Inside Her Tortured, Scribble-Happy World". Vanity Fair. Condé Nast. Retrieved 2023-04-10.
  10. ↑ Munoz, Gabriela (3 May 2012). "Understanding Frida Kahlo's fertility problems". scienceillustrated.com.au. Retrieved 2023-04-10.
  11. 1 2 Smith, Roberta (3 April 2015). "Review: 'Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo in Detroit'". The New York Times. ISSN   0362-4331 . Retrieved 2023-04-11.
  12. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Bernstein, Helene B.; Black, Charlene Villaseñor (December 2008). "Frida Kahlo: Realistic Reproductive Images in the Early Twentieth Century". The American Journal of Medicine. 121 (12): 1114–1116. doi:10.1016/j.amjmed.2008.09.003. PMID   19028209.
  13. ↑ Lemmers, Marike; Verschoor, Marianne AC; Kim, Bobae Veronica; Hickey, Martha; Vazquez, Juan C.; Mol, Ben Willem J.; Neilson, James P. (2019). "Medical treatment for early fetal death (less than 24 weeks)". Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews. 2019 (6): CD002253. doi:10.1002/14651858.CD002253.pub4. PMC   6574399 . PMID   31206170 . Retrieved 2023-04-11.
  14. ↑ Rogers, Lisa John (29 April 2015). ""Abortion," "Miscarriage," or "Untitled"? A Frida Kahlo Lithograph's Complicated History". Hyperallergic. Retrieved 2023-04-10.
  15. ↑ Landau, Ellen G. (2016). "Review of Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo in Detroit; Frida Kahlo's Garden". Woman's Art Journal. 37 (1): 56–58. ISSN   0270-7993. JSTOR   26452058.
  16. ↑ "Frida and the Miscarriage". medhum.med.nyu.edu. Retrieved 2023-04-11.
  17. ↑ Hannickel, Erica (6 December 2022). "Scientific, Sexual and Sentimental: What Frida Kahlo Saw in the Orchid". Literary Hub. Retrieved 2023-04-11.
  18. ↑ Hannickel, Erica (2022). Orchid muse : a history of obsession in fifteen flowers (First ed.). New York, NY. ISBN   978-0-393-86728-2. OCLC   1294284084.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
  19. ↑ Yashinsky, Michael (1 March 2015). "Frida, A Life of Agony and Poetry". The Metropolitan. Retrieved 2023-04-11.
  20. ↑ "Detroit Industry Murals". Detroit Institute of Arts Museum. Retrieved 2023-04-11.
  21. ↑ Antelo, Fernando (1 May 2013). "Pain and the Paintbrush: The Life and Art of Frida Kahlo". AMA Journal of Ethics. 15 (5): 460–465. doi: 10.1001/virtualmentor.2013.15.5.imhl1-1305 . ISSN   2376-6980. PMID   23680570.
  22. ↑ Garber, Elizabeth (March 1992). "Art Critics on Frida Kahlo: A Comparison of Feminist and Non-Feminist Voices". Art Education. 45 (2): 42–48. doi:10.2307/3193324. JSTOR   3193324.
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