Grupo Soap is joining forces with “pop-up” gallery Art Jones Gallery to create Nuestra Frida (Our Frida): Interpretations, Explorations, Exploitations.

Nuestra Frida is a response to the major Frida Kahlo show on exhibit now at the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis. In this exhibition, Grupo’s artists address not only the art and colorful life of Mexican artist Frida Kahlo, but the cult of devotion, the mythology, the commericialization, and the pop culture fame surrounding her.

The artists use photography, painting, drawing, installation and ritual, printing, sculpture, tee shirts, and conceptual art to a give the audience a 21st century take on this important figure in art history. For example, North Minneapolis artist Satyarthi has painted portraits of Frida on both canvas and tuxedo jackets, and Douglas Padilla is a creating an ofrenda (altar for the dead) in collaboration with dozens of "friends of Frida Kahlo" that he has found on internet networking site Myspace.com. Artist and designer Luis Fitch has produced a special Frida tee shirt for the show, while Northeast artist James Grafsgaard has collaborated with Mexican artist Patricia Mendoza to create a photographic series that addresses Frida's European and Mexican mestizo heritage.

About the group: Grupo Soap del Corazón was founded in 2000 by Xavier Tavera and Douglas Padilla to celebrate Latino artists and culture and the Latinization of Lake Street in Minneapolis, Minnesota, U.S.A. Grupo Soap started its efforts with an inaugural exhibition at Gus Lucky’s Gallery on Lake Street in Minneapolis entitled Soap del Corazón. In that show each artist addressed, visually, the questions: What is “soap of the heart? What cleans the heart?”

In it’s six year existence Grupo Soap del Corazón has stayed true to it’s purpose: to encourage and exhibit “Soap del Corazón”, art that cleans the heart. It has showcased the work of 40 artists in exhibitions which have garnered local and national publicity and critical acclaim. Well over 100,000 people have seen its art.

Exhibiting artists include: Claudia Billy Baca, Gabriela Bertiller (Argentina), Pete Driessen, Luis Fitch, Ruthann Godellei, James Grafsgaard, Patricia Mendoza (Mexico), Celeste Nelms, Steve Nuno Nunez, Douglas Padilla, Nancy Robinson, (Amaru) Marcela Rodriguez Aguila (Chile), Satiyarthi, Melissa Stang, Maria Cristina Tavera, and Xavier Tavera.

Additionally, Art Jones Gallery and Grupo Soap del Corazon will present Salon Artisimo: Devotion and Dollars - Is Frida for Sale? on Wednesday, December 5 at 7pm at the Casket Arts Building gallery. Panelists will include Betsy Carpenter, co-curator of the Walker Art Center's Frida Kahlo exhibit; Juanita Garciagodoy, independent scholar and former Macalester Spanish professor; Ruthann Godellei, Grupo Soap artist and Macalester art professor; and Maria Cristina Tavera, Grupo Soap artist and Kahlo bibliographer.

What: Nuestra Frida (Our Frida): Interpretations, Explorations, Exploitations
Where: Casket Arts Building, Minneapolis, MN
When: December 1-January 5, 2008.
Admission is FREE and open to the public

What: Salon Artisimo: Devotion and Dollars - Is Frida for Sale?
Where: Casket Arts Building, Minneapolis, MN
When: December 5, 7 pm
Admission is FREE and open to the public

Frida Kahlo exhibition at the Walker Art Center
Get details on this major exhibition of Frida Kahlo's paintings, on display now at the Walker Art Center and through January 20, 2008.

"A Convert to the Cult of Frida," essay by Lorena Duarte
Read Lorena Duarte's lyrical essay on the evolution of Frida Kahlo the artist into "Frida" the cultural and social icon.

Mixed Media