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Little Artist Lesson: Frida Kahlo Self-Portraits
I wanted a lesson to teach the kids about Mexican artists. What better choice than the painter Frida Kahlo? The kids first learned a little about Frida Kahlo’s life and then about her famous style of art. Then, we learned how to draw faces for self-portraits and finished them in the style of Kahlo.
About Frida Kahlo
Frida Kahlo was born in Mexico City in 1907. Her dad was German and gave her the name Frida which means “peace” in German. Frida was born in a blue house which is now a museum dedicated to Kahlo called La Casa Azul. Early on, Frida survived a serious bus accident. She had to undergo more than 30 medical procedures in her lifetime as a result of the accident. While she was recovering, she taught herself how to paint.
The Art of Frida Kahlo
Throughout her career, Frida created 143 paintings. Of those 143 paintings, 55 of them were self-portraits. Her art was heavily influenced by the indigenous Mexican culture. She favored bright and bold colors and painted with a mix of realism and symbolism. Many of her works explored topics like identity, gender, class, and race.
The Art Lesson
In this art lesson, the kids learned how to draw faces. This helped them to draw a self-portrait in the style of Kahlo. For this lesson, we used plain white drawing paper, a pencil, an eraser, and whatever medium they chose to color the picture in with. Most opted for colored pencils.
Step One
To start, lay your paper in portrait direction. Take your pencil and lightly draw an oval shape in the center or top two thirds of your paper. You can make several strokes and them go back and erase the lines you do not like. This is why it is best to draw lightly.
Step Two
Next, lightly draw a vertical line down the middle of the oval, then a horizontal line across the middle of the oval.
Step Three
Make a small marking line in the center of the left side of the oval and the vertical dividing line. Repeat the same on the right side. And again with the bottom half of the vertical line.
Step Four
Then, make a small marking line along the vertical line, dividing the bottom most section in half (see the photo). These marking will help determine the placement of the eyes, nose and mouth.
Step Five
The next step is setting the eyes and nose in place. Draw a small circle sitting on the marking line as shown in the picture. Next, draw a circle around each of the marking lines on the horizontal line. Once these circles are in place, you can go ahead and erase those first vertical and horizontal dividing lines.
Step Six
Next, it is time to draw the eye shape. Draw an oval or almond or round shape around the circle to create your outer eye shape. Then go ahead and darken the inner circle to create the iris shape of the eye. Add a little line on the top of the eye to create an eye lid. Go ahead and clean up the area a little by erasing any lines that you no longer want or need around the eye.
Step Seven
Typically, there is symmetry to the face. Now no face is perfectly symmetrical, so a little unevenness is realistic. With that said, there are a few standard measurements you can use when drawing a face. First, the distance between one side of the eye to the other is the same on both eyes. This distance is also the same as the distance between the two eyes. That distance is also the same as the distance from one side of the nose/nostril to the other.
Step Eight
Make a slight “U” shape under the nose circle. Then erase the rest of the circle. This is now the tip of your nose. Carefully add in tiny dark ovals at the ends to create the nostrils. Use your finger to trace downwards from the inner corner of the eye to the bottom of the nose tip. Make a small dot marker. Repeat with the other side. These dots indicate where the sides of the nose should be. I adjusted mine a little because I felt that measurement was not accurate for me.
Step Nine
Next, we will add some eyebrows. I told the kids to run their fingertip along the side of their nose all the way up along their brow bone. Then we drew the lines to mimic that on the picture. The end of the eyebrow typically begins at the inner corner of the eye. Use short strokes to create the eyebrows. You can either keep or erase the nose lines when you are done drawing the brows.
Step Ten
Now draw the mouth. The corners of the mouth typically reach to the center of the eyes. You can measure that out and make little marker dots next to the marker line from earlier. Draw a line from the left dot to the right dot to create the middle line of the mouth. Then draw a line to create the lower lip, and then another to create the upper lip. Just like the nose, you can always adjust it to fit what you think your face looks like. These measurements are just guidelines.
Step Twelve
Once the face is complete, we can add in the details that help to make it similar to a Frida Kahlo self-portrait. She usually has a choker on, so we added a simple necklace. The flowers on her head are a must. Then we created a leaf background similar to one of Kahlo’s more popular backgrounds.
Final Step
Then, just finish off the Kahlo-inspired self portrait with some bright and vibrant colors. This brings the whole portrait to life!