Week 3

For my sketchbook stencil, I chose an image of Frida Kahlo. I chose this image because of how important she has become to me in recent months. I love her art and the messages behind it. I identify in a lot of ways with some of the struggles that she went through in her life. For about a year now, I have been dealing with a debilitating illness. It has kept me physically weak, emotionally drained and just generally tired. In my times of greatest darkness, I turned to her paintings and even some of her diary entries to keep me going. I had periods where I couldn't even get out of bed and it meant a lot to me that I wasn't the first to experience this pain and isolation. I also dealt with an abusive relationship in a similar way that she did, at this time. To me she is an amazing disabled icon, even though I rarely read anything about her that specifically identifies her as "disabled." There is very little visibility for disabled people and I think especially for disabled women of color. There is a limited understanding about what it means to be sick or disabled. I hope that through her visibility as an icon as Chicanisma, more people can come to see that the struggles of sick and disabled people come to be understood and respected.