La Esmeralda (art school)

The Ministry of Public Education’s School of Painting and Sculpture in Mexico City, named after the street where it was first located. In Hayden Herrera’s Frida it is where Frida teaches from 1943.

At a glance

Source	Author	Role	In one line
Frida	Hayden Herrera	setting	A shabby school where Frida teaches from 1943 and sends her students out to paint the streets and fields.

Frida — Hayden Herrera (1983)

Source: Frida - A Biography of Frida Kahlo · Original · Readwise highlight

Though the school’s plant was shabby and primitive, consisting of one large classroom and a patio where the students painted (when it rained, the patio flooded and the students had to walk about on planks), to the teachers at La Esmeralda, all Mexico was a studio.

• Role: setting
• In the book: The school opens in 1942 under Antonio Ruiz, with Rivera teaching composition and Frida paid 252 pesos for twelve hours a week. Its Mexicanista teachers send students out to work from nature rather than from plaster casts. When the trip becomes too hard for her, Frida moves her teaching to her house in Coyoacán.
• Why it matters: Teaching here makes Frida the mentor of a group of young painters, “Los Fridos”, whose murals follow in the book.