64 Inspirational Frida Kahlo Quotes [2024]

•

Updated: January 20th, 2022

Frida Kahlo is one of the greatest Mexican painters.

She is known for her many portraits, works inspired by the nature and artifacts of Mexico, and paintings about her experience of chronic pain. She is also famed for her unwavering and brilliantly colored self-portraits.

Tate Modern, Uk's popular art gallery located in London, considers Kahlo as one of the most significant artists of the 20th century. Art historian Elizabeth Bakewell also says that she's one of Mexico's most important 20th-century figures.

Some of her notable painting includes Frieda and Diego Rivera, The Suicide of Dorothy Hale, and The Broken Column.

We've put together an incredible collection of Frida Kahlo quotes to read.

Here they are:

64 Inspirational Frida Kahlo Quotes [2024]

List of Inspiring Frida Kahlo Quotes

“At the end of the day, we can endure much more than we think we can.” ― Frida Kahlo

“I don't paint dreams or nightmares, I paint my own reality.” ― Frida Kahlo

“Nothing is absolute. Everything changes, everything moves, everything revolves, everything flies and goes away.” ― Frida Kahlo

“You deserve the best, the very best, because you are one of the few people in this lousy world who are honest to themselves, and that is the only thing that really counts.” ― Frida Kahlo

“Nothing is worth more than laughter. It is strength to laugh and to abandon oneself, to be light.” ― Frida Kahlo

“I think that little by little I’ll be able to solve my problems and survive.” ― Frida Kahlo

“Pain, pleasure, and death are no more than a process for existence. The revolutionary struggle in this process is a doorway open to intelligence.” ― Frida Kahlo

“Only one mountain can know the core of another mountain.” ―Frida Kahlo

“I am my own muse, I am the subject I know best. The subject I want to know better.” ― Frida Kahlo

"You deserve a lover who makes you feel safe, who can consume this world whole if he walks hand in hand with you; someone who believes that his embraces are a perfect match with your skin." ― Frida Kahlo

“I must fight with all my strength so that the little positive things that my health allows me to do might be pointed toward helping the revolution. The only real reason for living.” ― Frida Kahlo

“I want to be inside your darkest everything.” ― Frida Kahlo

“Painting completed my life.” ― Frida Kahlo

“I am not sick. I am broken. But I am happy to be alive as long as I can paint.” ― Frida Kahlo

“I paint flowers so they will not die.” ― Frida Kahlo

“I paint my own reality. The only thing I know is that I paint because I need to, and I paint whatever passes through my head without any other consideration.” ― Frida Kahlo

“You are all the combinations of numbers of life.” ― Frida Kahlo

“Why do I need feet when I have wings to fly?” ― Frida Kahlo

“I put on the canvas whatever comes into my mind.” ― Frida Kahlo

“I tried to drown my sorrows but the bastards learned how to swim.” ― Frida Kahlo

“Your word travels the entirety of space and reaches my cells which are my stars then goes to yours which are my light.” ― Frida Kahlo

“My paintings are well-painted, not nimbly but patiently.” ― Frida Kahlo

“Passion is the bridge that takes you from pain to change.” ― Frida Kahlo

“You didn’t understand what I am. I am love. I am pleasure. I am essence. I am an idiot. I am tenacious. I am. I simply am.” ― Frida Kahlo

“Take a lover who looks at you like maybe you are a bourbon biscuit.” ― Frida Kahlo

“What I wanted to express very clearly and intensely was that the reason these people had to invent or imagine heroes and gods is pure fear. Fear of life and fear of death.” ― Frida Kahlo

“Don’t build a wall around your suffering. It may devour you from the inside.” ― Frida Kahlo

“I wish I could do whatever I liked behind the curtain of “madness.” ― Frida Kahlo

"There isn’t enough time there, isn’t enough nothing. There is only reality. What once was is long gone! What remains, are the transparent roots appearing transformed into an eternal fruit tree Your fruits already give scent your flowers give color blooming in the joy of wind and flower.” ― Frida Kahlo

“Everyone’s opinions about things change over time. Nothing is constant. Everything changes.”
― Frida Kahlo

“To trap one’s self-suffering is to risk being devoured from the inside.” ― Frida Kahlo

“There is nothing left everything revolves.” ― Frida Kahlo

“We like being sick to protect ourselves. Someone – something – always protects us from the truth – Our own ignorance and fear. Fear of everything – fear of knowing that we are no more than vectors direction construction and destruction to be alive.” ― Frida Kahlo

“Mankind owns its destiny, and its destiny is the earth. We are destroying it until we have no destiny.” ― Frida Kahlo

“I want a storm to come and flood us into a song that no one wrote.” ― Frida Kahlo

“I have never expected anything from my work but the satisfaction I could get from it by the very fact of painting and saying what I couldn’t say otherwise.” ― Frida Kahlo

"Loyalty is important to me. Can you be loyal?” ― Frida Kahlo

“Surrealism is the magical surprise of finding a lion in a wardrobe, where you were ‘sure’ of finding shirts.” ― Frida Kahlo

“They say never trust a limping dog or the tears of a woman.” ― Frida Kahlo

“My blood is a miracle that, from my veins, crosses the air in my heart into yours.” ― Frida Kahlo

“You deserve a lover who takes away the lies and brings you hope, coffee, and poetry.” ― Frida Kahlo

"I believe that by working I will forget the sorrows." ― Frida Kahlo

"My subjects have always been my sensations, my states of mind and the profound reactions that life has been producing in me…" ― Frida Kahlo

"Fall in love with yourself, with life, and then with whoever you want." ― Frida Kahlo

"I would like to give you everything I never had, but not even then would you know how beautiful is it to love you." ― Frida Kahlo

“I don’t need rescuing, Diego.” ― Frida Kahlo

"Take a lover who looks at you like maybe you are magic." ― Frida Kahlo

"I heaven you, so my wings will open wide to love you soundlessly." ― Frida Kahlo

“I just want your serious opinion.” ― Frida Kahlo

"I do not want a half-hearted love, torn and cut in half." ― Frida Kahlo

" I love you more than my own skin." ― Frida Kahlo

"I am that clumsy human, always loving, loving, loving. And loving. And never leaving." ― Frida Kahlo

“Everything can have beauty, even the worst horror.” ― Frida Kahlo

“Why do I call him my Diego? He never was or will be mine. He belongs to himself.” ― Frida Kahlo

"Love is like an aroma, like a current, like rain." ― Frida Kahlo

"I was born a painter." ― Frida Kahlo

"I leave you my portrait so that you will have my presence all the days and nights that I am away from you." ― Frida Kahlo

“You deserve a lover who wants you disheveled, with everything and all the reasons that wake you up in haste and the demons that won’t let you sleep.” ― Frida Kahlo

"I was a child who went about in a world of colors." ― Frida Kahlo

“All this anger has simply made me understand better that I love you more than my own skin, and that even though you don’t love me as much, you love me a little anyway — don’t you? If this is not true, I’ll always be hopeful that it could be, and that’s enough for me.” ― Frida Kahlo

“It’s not possible to present an accurate picture of our culture without all the voices of the people in the culture. So at the emerging level, you can’t have a good survey art show without women and artists of color.” ― Frida Kahlo

"You deserve a lover who listens when you sing, who supports you when you feel shame and respects your freedom; who flies with you and isn't afraid to fall." ― Frida Kahlo

"We have to be honest: women can’t live without pain." ― Frida Kahlo

"What doesn’t kill me, nourishes me." ― Frida Kahlo

meet the author

Pat Walls

I'm Pat Walls and I created Starter Story - a website dedicated to helping people start businesses. We interview entrepreneurs from around the world about how they started and grew their businesses.

See full profile