Frida Kahlo Museum (The Blue House)
Viva la Vida: The Watermelons of Farewell
A few days before she died, Frida wrote “Viva la vida” on the flesh of a watermelon.
Location: Painting Halls (Halls 1 to 3), Frida Kahlo Museum (The Blue House).
This painting is a group of open watermelons. When you look at it closely, you see that there are letters on the flesh of one of them. They say Viva la vida, and then the place and the year: Coyoacán, nineteen fifty-four. Frida painted the inscription with the same care she gave to everything else.
It is the last year of her life. In August of nineteen fifty-three, her right leg was amputated below the knee. Her health was very fragile. On the second of July, nineteen fifty-four, she went out in a wheelchair to a march. She died eleven days later, on the thirteenth of July, at the age of forty-seven. The museum counts this painting among her last great works and says that she finished it a few days before her death.
Now think about the subject. The watermelon is a fruit with a very Mexican meaning. Its colors, green, white and red, recall those of the flag. It appears at festivals, at market stalls, and also in the offerings of the Day of the Dead. The museum explains that Frida saw the watermelon as a joyful fruit, a symbol of Mexico. Some read in those open slices a gesture of life and of farewell at the same time. There is no need to settle on a single reading. Both fit.
Frida had painted fruit before. In the same hall, a still life from nineteen forty-two is on display. It is painted on a round base, which is called a tondo, from an Italian word that means round. So fruit was a subject she knew well, and one she loved.
There is something else worth noticing. Frida almost always painted herself. A large part of her work is self-portraits. This time she is not here. There is no face, no bed, no crutches. There are only fruits, color and a phrase. Perhaps that is why it feels so open. It is as if she no longer needed to show you her body to tell you what she wanted to tell you.
Years later, the painting traveled the world through popular culture. The British band Coldplay took its title for an album and a tour, as the museum itself recounts in its wall labels for children.
In nineteen fifty-three Frida had painted another still life with watermelons, with a similar composition. The one from nineteen fifty-four is the one that bears the final inscription. Perhaps that is why it is considered her farewell.
Stay a moment in front of the watermelons. See how the red flesh contrasts with the green rind. Then read the two words of the inscription again, as if they were her farewell.
Listen to the full audio guide for Frida Kahlo Museum (The Blue House)
72-hour pass for US$10, no subscription.