Consuelo Kanaga had a warm human touch and sharp journalist's eye. This book of her life as a photographer is a gem for those interested in photography as art and expression. It could also serve as a good source of material for art or women's studies researchers, and even photographers who are looking to their predecessors to improve and expand their own work. Her images reflect a humane view of and connection with her subjects: the exquisite quality of light and composition, and deft, almost brutal editing betray her great technical skill. The very readable and informative text is peppered with small photos, while the remainder of the book is filled with beautifully reproduced full-page plates. Just as Consuelo Kanaga is a photographer as worthy of recognition as her more famous colleagues, this volume of her work is worthy of a place on the shelf of any aficionado or enthusiast of photography.

Review Summary: Tina Modotti achieved a remarkable level of accomplishment in a photographic career that spanned merely 7 years and 250 images. Her work captures many of the best elements of the compositional skills of Edward Weston, her mentor and lover, while adding a heart-felt attraction for people that Mr. Weston's work lacked. These images of portraits, still lifes, and architecture from her years in Mexico are much more appealing to me than Mr. Weston's are from the same period. The extensive biographical essay also corrects many misconceptions about Ms. Modotti's life.

Reader Warning: This book contains some partial female nudity, mostly of women nursing their babies.

Review: "Tina Modotti is the best-known unknown photographer of the twentieth century . . . ." Her work exhibits "extraordinary formal clarity coupled with incisive social content." Her style obviously was influenced by Edward Weston, due to their long association and personal closeness. Other influences include the Movimento Estridentista (the Mexican reaction to Futurism), New Vision, and the German Arbeiter-Fotograf movement. The vision is uniquely hers.

My assumption is that you have never seen her work. I certainly never had. Ms. Modotti's images are a nice surprise. Often books that make these kinds of claims about their subject don't have the content to support them. This one does live up to its bold premise about her photography. Of her own work, Ms. Modotti observed that her purpose was "to produce not art but honest photographs." All of her images are contact prints, and her technique shows the minimum of trying to provide eye candy. What they do show is a wonderful eye for the interesting and heart-warming. You will have a much more emotional reaction to these images than to the photographs of many outstanding photographers, a group in which Ms. Modotti belongs.

Relatively unschooled in a formal sense, she was an emotionally-based Communist. Some may not appreciate the political content of some of her images, such as the various ways of portraying the hammer and sickle symbol of the Soviet Union. I thought that these photographs were among the least interesting of her works.

Her life history was an interesting surprise to me. Coming from a poor family in Italy, she appears to have pulled herself up by the bootstraps as a seamstress. First working in garment factories, she probably became a costume seamstress and from there launched her performing career as an actress and model. Often portrayed as the lover and friend of various famous men, she probably viewed them as an appendage to her. History has been successfully revised in the excellent biographical sketch in this book.

My favorite images in the book include:

Edward Weston, 1924; Open Doors, c. 1925; Staircase, c. 1924-26; Convent of Tepotzotlan (Stairs Through Arches), 1924; Geranium, c. 1924-25; Easter Lily and Bud, c. 1925; Interior of Church, 1924; Elisa Kneeling, 1924; Carelton Beals, 1924; Portrait of a Woman, c. 1926-29; Federico Marin, 1926; Ione Robinson, 1929; Two Children or Boys from Colonia del la Bolsa, c. 1927-28; Hands Resting on Tool, 1927; Woman with Flag, 1928; Techuantepec Type (Woman Smiling), c. 1929; and Young Pioneers, 1930.

The images for the first two or three years could easily have been done by Edward Weston, but show a connection to daily living that his more ethereal works do not display. After that, the works definitely separate in content, style, and focus. If you like Mr. Weston's work, you may enjoy comparing his Mexican images with hers.

After producing all but a few of these photographs, Ms. Modotti left Mexico for Russia and eventually played an important role in the Spanish Civil War in evacuating children and as a nurse. All of those parts of her life are recounted in the book's biographical essay.

After you enjoy these uplifting views of the nobility of people, nature, and of human efforts, I suggest that you think about what you convey about these subjects to your children or grandchildren. Do they know what your views are and why you hold them? If not, you might consider taking photographs and writing notes to go with them to help share your vision of the world. Whether they agree or not, you will enrich them in important ways.

Seek out the best in every situation!

I was put off by this book for a few years before I got around to reading it because of the odd nature of Frida's drawings and doodlings, inks spillls morfing into "art" and in general the seemingly difficult text to follow. All this changed upon a recent trip to Mexico, amongst the tranquil backdrop of Mismaloya and unforgetable sunsets in this tropical paradise I was able to whip through this book. The serenity of the place helped me get through Frida's chaos. After reading her own insights and feelings about life I wanted more. Her bizarre life, filled with more theatre and characters than a Fellini film, more physical and mental agony than most humans can endure is one that deserves her own thoughts, although at times they are convoluted. Whether she was under the influence(many of her last years she was doped to mask the pain) or not is irrevelant because the text is spellbinding with illustrations that captivate the imagination, taking the reader along a surrealistic journey as only Frida can. It is a grotesquely beautiful book, rich in imagery , both literally as well as illustrated in the unique style of Frida Kahlo, reflective of the pain and suffering she lived, both self inflicted and her own fate. It is quite simply, Frida in her own words. The book is a handsome collection of thoughts and drawings by one of the greatest Latin American artists of the twentieth century. The author takes the liberty of interpreting each page, giving her perspective concerning the thoughts of Frida in a very helpful manner. The first part of the book is the diary, in writting and print and as colorful and bold as Frida was, whereas the second part is the type written text of the Frida's hallucianatory ramblings and drawings. This proves to a beneficail companion to reading each page, first by Frida followed by the clearer typed "translation" in thesecond part of the book. Without the type written text some sections are nearly impossible to decipher. The various sketches are shown in their embyonic stages and would later become part of her major works are truly amazing. If you are a lover of the works of Frida Kahlo this is a fine book to add to your collection of Kahlo memorabilia. This book is a perfect companion to Hayden Herrera's definitive biography. Incidently, my desire for more of Frida in her own words (this one is in Spanish mostly)was quenched recently by finding a book entitled "Escritura" by Frida Kahlo that is series of poems, letters and notes selected by Raquel Tibol. I highly suggest reading both if you are a Kahlophile.

This very intimate book accomplishes what no bio can: show us inside Kahlo, via her own ramblings and disorganization and odd illustartions and ink spills and lines, and drawings, etc. It is a weird highway to the inner mind of the goddess of 20th century art.

With a movie in the works ..., Kahlo is sure to solidify her position as the top-of-the-art-food-chain Latin American artist of the century (Georgia O'Keefe considered her the best female artist of the 20th century) and make her iconic face even more famous.

Kahlo deserves this position because she painted honestly and brutally. She painted her memorable Jewish-Austrian-Spanish-Mexican face, single eyebrow and slim moustache in stark honesty; she had many lovers of both sexes (when such a course of sex exploits was practically unknown); she grabbed her Mexicanity with a fierce pride and ferocity that would not be in vogue until decades after her death (Kahlo was born in 1907 and died in 1954) and yet during her life she was just the wife of a very famous Mexican muralist and a champagne Communist who partied with the Fords and Rockefellers while marching with the workers down the wide avenues of Mexico City. It is thus ironic that it is Kahlo, whose astonishing life and unique paintings are now the subject of lawsuits between governments and collectors, has taken the limelight from her talented womanizer husband and is rightfully considered one of the best artists of the 20th century, period. This is a nice addition and a must read for Kahlophiles.

This book gives an interesting view of the person who was Frida Kahlo, in her own very personal words and images. It is a bit sad that something so private has been made rather accessible, but it is good for lovers of Kahlo's art. The book is inspiring; it is quite creatively stimulating with the lush, free images and round scrawls in many colours. The introduction by Carlos Fuentes is well-written, and I especially liked his description of seeing Frida Kahlo at a Wagner opera. The essay by Sarah Lowe is likewise good. The reproductions of the diary pages look very good and clear (though since I haven't seen the originals, I'm just assuming they are accurate), the size of the pages is large enough, and the colours are all very vivid. The commentary is in a separate section from the diary reproduction, which is nice because you can look uninterrupted at the diary part, and not have to worry about what it all means. It does make for a lot of flipping back and forth when reading the commentary and referring back to the diary page, even though the page discussed is reproduced in black and white (very small) in the commentary. The commentary is rather sparse, and not all the pages of the diary are discussed. All in all a fascinating read.