October 19, 2025
The annual Armando Garza-Sada Sr. Lecture complements the forthcoming exhibition Frida: The Making of an Icon, which opens in January.

Frida Kahlo was a pioneer in fashioning the disabled body. Beginning in early childhood, Kahlo (1907–1954) developed a profound understanding of the self-empowering role that clothes, accessories, and art-making played in reflecting and constructing her complex identity. Through art and fashion, she concealed and revealed both her disabilities and exceptional abilities. 

Art historian and curator Gannit Ankori discusses Kahlo’s experiences with disability, detailing how the artist’s life and work affirm an alternative way of being.

About the Speaker
Gannit Ankori, the Henry and Lois Foster Director and Chief Curator of the Rose Art Museum at Brandeis University, is renowned for her scholarship on Frida Kahlo. Ankori’s books include Frida Kahlo/Critical Lives; and Imaging Her Selves: Frida Kahlo’s Poetics of Identity and Fragmentation. In collaboration with Indigenous Mexican fashion curator and scholar Circe Henestrosa, Ankori has been involved in projects such as the exhibition Frida Kahlo: POSE.

Plan Your Visit

• This program is included with Museum admission.
• The lecture takes place in Brown Auditorium Theater on the Lower Level of the Law Building. Seating is available on a first-come, first-served basis.
• Parking Information | Museum Hours | MFAH Campus Map