Viva Frida Kahlo Immersive Experience – A Modern Epiphany  Lichthalle Maag, Zürich  22.09.2021 – 02.01.2022 

“Acid and tender, hard as steel and delicate and fine as a butterfly’s wing, lovable as a beautiful smile, and profound and cruel as the bitterness of life.” 

An interplay between antagonistic elements, dramatic music and onomatopoeic sound effects, brutally realistic illustrations of pain and agony, as well as the celebration of life and love, a most vivid multi-sensory experience, on the verge of catharsis, is what one can expect upon entering the Lichthalle Maag in Zurich. Kahlo’s paintings are awoken to life on more than 34 m long and 10 m high wooden walls, as well as on the floor and on the ceiling of the Lichthalle Maag, by means of 39 high-performance projectors. ( 22.09.2021 – 02.01.2022). It is the first time ever that Immersive Experience presents an outlook on her work at large-scale, outside Mexico. Viva Frida Kahlo Immersive Experience @Lichthalle MAAG – MAAG Music & Arts AG ( 22.09.2021 – 02.01.2022)

The viewer is initiated into a digitally recreated biographical journey, following the footsteps of Frida Kahlo, under her self-revealing guidance. During this intimate encounter, the visitor becomes an inherent part of this virtual Immersive Experience, a modern composition incorporating artistic heritage and the latest digital tools. We are no longer detached viewers but we become part of a unique artistic oeuvre that triggers a wide spectrum of sensations and emotions, a monumental and fascinating kaleidoscope.  

Frida Kahlo’s world is a most unconventional combination of antagonistic elements. Behind the mesmerizing tones and rich, colourful shades, there is a long history of physical traumas. A juxtaposition of brutal and detailed depiction of sufferance as well as a powerful, hedonistic celebration of life, despite all its bitterness and brutality. The search  for identity, the depiction of love, life, as well as the body and the physical world with a variety of sensations, impregnated with excruciating pain and sufferance, are all equally central themes in her work.   

Frida Kahlo’s distinctive uniqueness and strength lies in her vulnerability. Despite being subject to prolonged physical suffering, she is able to deconstruct pain and detach herself from its devastating effects, by means of exploring its depths to the most frail and finest details, in a desperate attempt to understand and rationalize its absurdity.   

Her paintings are paradoxically colourful and vivid testimonials, bearing the scars of a lifetime shrouded in sorrow and yet, only on rare occasions she succumbs and gives in to pain, portraying herself as a victim. It is this unprecedented seizure and exhaustive thematization of sufferance that provides her with a mystical force, dragging her out of the damnation of our mortal world. Being bedridden, she started painting on her plaster corsets during her hospitalization, after a devastating bus accident, which kept her immobilized for several months. The severe injuries she suffered during the accident made it impossible for her to have children. 

At first glance, there is almost a trail of masochistic pleasure in her minute depictions of extreme physical sensations, which remind us of detailed medical reports, however this is a strategy and an attempt to elude pain. There is no such thing as too brutal or too unconventional for her brush, sufferance in all its devastating forms, becomes an inherent part during the artistic endeavour. 

The process of creation is a simultaneous attempt to depict and embrace pain by deconstructing its brutality. Her unconventional, exotic and incredibly eclectic world is a perfect medium for  the virtual Immersive Experience through dramatic and vividly depicted struggle, unveiling a story behind each painting, a collection of  surrealistic reconstructions of her own, tragic reality.  

Within the frames of the global perspective, there is a constant need to redefine the artistic phenomenon, there is a constant urge to challenge and deconstruct the artistic experience, operating beyond the traditional boundaries we are used to. There is an undeniable need to integrate diversity of methodologies, perspectives and tools and the Immersive Experience is a most elaborate example in this sense. Art within art, by means of incorporating digital tools, light effects, dramatic music and sound effects, scenography and movie element, that enable the artistic process to undergo a set of metamorphoses. All these, pertinently combined, take the Immersive Experience to an unprecedented level.   

Viva Frida Kahlo Immersive Experience  is a celebration of a woman ahead of her time, as well as a tribute to a most colourful, eclectic and bizarre nature, whose artistic legacy is one of our most valuable and inexhaustible sources of inspiration.  

About the author:

Orsolya Farkas Miron comes from a bilingual family, Hungarian and Romanian. She has a MA in Intercultural Communication. After teaching English for 7 years in primary and secondary level, she landed in Zurich, where she had the chance to try herself out during several interesting projects. For the time being she is a freelance writer and painter. In 2019 she had an exhibition in Volketswil. She is passionate about digital drawing and acrylic painting. She also organizes a public event for women, once a month. During these events they tackle issues like integration, language courses, job searching opportunities and many other topics that concern minorities in Swiss society.

• Frida Kahlo
• Lichthalle Maag
• painting
• Viva Frida Kahlo Immersive Experience