In this painting, she uses coconut to project her pain and frustration hence, the portrayal of a weeping coconut. Kahlo created the Weeping Coconuts painting at a time when she relied on prescription medication to ease her chronic pain. She often mixed the painkillers with alcohol, which affected her ability to paint with detail. When this painting is compared to similar pictures that were completed earlier in the year, e.g. The Still Life with Flag, there are dramatic differences especially in terms of precision and detail.
In this painting, the focus is on the weeping coconut. The coconut is impersonated to portray a weeping human being, presumably symbolising Frida's passionate state at the time and the loss of her ability to paint as she would before. She uses some pretty dull shades; not the usual striking colours she used on previous artwork. Also, Frida does not show any enthusiasm to convey a political message; it's just a back to nature still life painting, probably developed to pass time. Additionally, she does not make detailed brush strokes as when creating self-portraits.
Most of her inspiration for this piece was from her degrading physical appearance. Khalo no longer felt the need to portray her actual image in a self-portrait thus, projected her pain to still life drawings. She painted this particular piece as a gift to Elena Border, her physician friend hence the writing For Elena Painted with Great Affection on the flag. Sadly, Elena didn’t like this painting and returned it to Kahlo in a bid to get a different one in exchange. Frida didn’t create another piece. Instead, she painted over the inscription For Elena and put it up for sale.
Related Artworks
Still Life with Parrot and Flag - Frida created this piece a little earlier as shown by the great mastery of detail and use of vibrant colours. She includes a Mexican flag in this drawing to show her interest in Mexican politics.
Still Life with Flag - Kahlo developed this still life painting later in her life. At the time, she had lost her characteristic use of detailed brush strokes that defined her work. Instead, she used thick paint that appeared to be smeared randomly.
