Her paintings were a great artwork and attracted interest from great artists like Andre Breton who was a major influence in her artwork. She first exhibited her drawings in the year 1938 with the aid of Brexton at a New York gallery known as Julien Levy, just as Breton expected the exhibition was a great success.
Her artwork continued to do well as she was able to do more exhibitions after then. The self-portrait with a braid was one of her major artworks. This was based on her marriage struggles hence as an artist decided to use artwork to express her feelings. Frida Kahlo got married to Diego Rivera in the year 1939, they first met in a party. Diego Rivera himself was a renown and fine artist who could even design the artwork. Although they were a great match in terms of art, there marriage was not a 'fine art' itself as they went through a lot of concerns. These led to their divorce in the year 1939 which seemed to entirely affect her as she cut off her long hair.
As an artist, cutting her long hair resembled the agony she was going through and cutting it off was a way of relieving the pain. Cutting the hair was also a sign of rejecting her feminity, she did another artwork showing her bald head. In the following year in 1940, it worked out well and Frida with Diego Rivera remarried again. That was when she decided to do another drawing just as the previous portrait but this one with intertwined braids on the head. The braids showed she had again regained her feminity back and decided to accept it. The intertwined braids although symbolise the change and cycle of time. This meant that as time changes, circumstance or situations also shift unexpectedly.
In another exhibition in the year 1942 at New York in the modern art museum, the self portrait with braid was shown. The couple at first had challenges of unfaithfulness in the marriage which led to their divorce earlier. Although after the remarriage, they lived together up to the time she died. Frida uses her expertise in artwork to depict the theme of marriage struggles especially in her own.
