Frida and Diego left tangible reminders of their time in The City. But SF left a mark on them too. San Francisco played a role in the artists’ legacy.
The lives, loves and works of Mexican artists Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera have long fascinated other creators, inspiring dozens of books, films, dances, and works of art.
But it’s less widely known that San Francisco played a crucial role in their careers. They visited The City twice, each time at a critical moment in their creative and personal lives. The San Francisco press was charmed by the hulking, 250-pound Rivera and his comparatively tiny wife. A Chronicle reporter who met the couple at the airport gushed, “Rivera brought with him a contradistinct living picture, the charming, slim-waisted, high-heeled, nugget-beaded senorita who is his wife, Mrs. Frieda Kahlo Rivera, herself a portrait artist of ability ...
Indeed, Rivera and Kahlo wowed The City. They were lionized and feted at social and artistic events. The Call newspaper humorously reported that a reception for them was attended by “nearly everyone who has written a book or a poem, cornered the stock market, painted a picture, sung a song, represented his country as consul, crossed a desert on a camel, edited a magazine, or trod the boards.”
SFPD investigates Balboa Park nightclub shooting that injured 3 No arrests have been made and authorities haven’t released any information on a potential suspect When Rivera and Kahlo left San Francisco in 1931, their personal and artistic trajectories were pointing up. Rivera was soon to create some of his finest work for the Detroit Institute of Arts, and Kahlo was launched on what would prove to be a towering artistic career.
Indeed, when Rivera flew to San Francisco in 1940, it was a fortuitous escape. He had been hiding in Mexico after a gang of Stalinist hit men had unsuccessfully tried to kill Trotsky in a house near his, prompting Rivera to have his local patron, architect Timothy Pflueger, pull strings with the U.S. Embassy to get him on a flight.
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