Happy birthday, Frida Kahlo! Frida Kahlo’s birthday was on July 6. In this post I am going to take a look at the Sun in her birth chart through the lens of Hellenistic astrology.
The Sun in any chart is going to speak to the topics of purpose, expression of the individuality, and the intellectual framework through which a person expresses their personality or ego. The Sun describes the development of that personality expression over the course of their life.
In Frida’s birth chart, the Sun is in Cancer, describing her personality as primarily emotional, imaginative, cyclical. This Sun sign shows she is concerned with family, and the security and intimacy provided by home and chosen clan. Cancer Suns move softly through the world with great sensitivity to all things. Hers is a receptive personality that is open to being molded or receiving impressions — giving intuition and creativity. The Sun’s presence in a cardinal sign shows changeability and action concerning her body (Sun ruler of the 1st) or as a general way of being. This links to her prolific paintings in which she depicts many iterations of her self in different moods or states of experience, almost always symbolically.
As a quick observation, the ruler of the Sun’s chart is the exalted Moon in Taurus near the career-illuminating midheaven — the highest point in the chart. This speaks to her public recognition and success as an artist, even amidst the incredible pain she endured. This Moon is also the ruler of the 12th house, showing that her career activity and even success is linked to 12th house topics.
The Sun in Frida’s chart are located in the 12th house. The 12th house has to do with a number of topics, and it is generally considered a pretty unfortunate house. Some life topics it can show are loss, isolation, and pain. It is a darker place in the chart, but these are experiences that people have in the world, and astrology has to be able to speak to that.
So, the 12th house is definitely not among the easy houses in the chart, and we can see some of its challenging expressions illustrated in the life of Frida Kahlo.
As is well known, Kahlo was in a major bus accident at the age of 18, which forced her to be immobilized and restrained to a cast for three months following the accident. Over the span of her lifetime, Kahlo was never fully well, and she endured and went through the recovery process of over 30 operations. The pain she experienced led her to turn to alcohol and drug use for relief.
Yet Frida was a talented and prolific artist, who experienced recognition and success while she was alive. She had a solo exhibition in New York in 1938, and her painting The Frame was acquired by the Louvre, making her the first 20th century Mexican artist to be shown there. Kahlo remained productive even through the experience of a stormy marriage and living with and managing a nearly lifelong health condition.
The Sun in the chart is co-present with an exalted Jupiter. The function of that Jupiter is to raise high, award accolades, bestow luck, grace, and status. The presence of Fortune and the North Node in this chart amplify this.
There are several factors in the chart that describe and align with the narrative of Frida’s enduring fame for her substantial accomplishments; not leaving her alone to toil in obscurity, as might be the case if some of the symbols were alternatively configured.
The dignified planets in her chart lend themselves to the fortune she experienced amidst her pain.
¡Viva Frida Kahlo!
