A self-portrait created in 1940 by the renowned Mexican artist Frida Kahlo was auctioned in New York for $54.7 million US ($77 million Cdn) on Thursday, setting a new record as the highest sale price ever for a piece by a female artist. The painting, titled “El sueño (La cama)” or “The Dream (The Bed)” features Kahlo asleep in a bed and surpassed the previous record held by Georgia O’Keeffe’s “Jimson Weed/White Flower No. 1,” which sold for $44.4 million US at Sotheby’s in 2014.
Previously, the highest auction price for a Kahlo artwork was $34.9 million US (then $43.7 million Cdn) for “Diego and I,” a piece depicting the artist alongside her husband, Diego Rivera. While her paintings have reportedly sold for even higher amounts in private transactions, this self-portrait is among the limited Kahlo pieces held in private collections outside of Mexico, where her work is considered a national artistic treasure and cannot be exported or destroyed.
The painting, originating from an undisclosed private collection, is legally eligible for international sale. However, some art historians have raised concerns over the cultural implications of the sale, fearing that the artwork, not publicly displayed since the late 1990s, may disappear from public view after the auction. Requests have already been made for the painting to be featured in upcoming exhibitions in various cities, including New York, London, and Brussels.
Titled “El sueño (La cama),” the self-portrait portrays Kahlo asleep in a colonial-style bed suspended in the clouds, covered in a golden blanket and surrounded by crawling vines and leaves. Above the bed hovers a skeleton figure encased in dynamite. Kahlo, known for vividly depicting her life experiences, began painting while recovering from a bus accident at 18 years old. She endured numerous surgeries on her spine and pelvis, wearing casts until her death at 47 in 1954. During her bedridden years, Kahlo saw her bed as a symbol bridging life and death, exploring themes of mortality.
This artwork is the highlight of an auction featuring over 100 surrealist works by artists such as Salvador Dalí, René Magritte, Max Ernst, and Dorothea Tanning. Despite being associated with surrealism, Kahlo rejected this label, emphasizing that her art reflected her reality rather than dreams.
In a note accompanying the auction, Sotheby’s described the painting as a contemplation on the blurred line between sleep and death, with the suspended skeleton representing Kahlo’s anxiety about dying during sleep, influenced by her chronic pain and past traumas.
