Honorary YPs: Spotlight on Frida Kahlo & Valentina Tereshkova

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In celebration of Women’s History Month, YPNation is profiling notable women from history who achieved success or a notable accomplishment in their respective fields when they were in their twenties or thirties. And because of their impressive work, we’re recognizing these women as “honorary YPs.”
 
For part three of this four-part series, we honor artist Frida Kahlo and cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova.
 
Frida Kahlo (1907-1954)
Frida Kahlo achieved some success and recognition as a painter in her lifetime, but the reverence for her artwork has grown tremendously in the decades since her death. Kahlo is now considered one of Mexico’s most celebrated artists. Her home in Coyocoan, Mexico, the “Blue House,” or Casa Azul, became a museum in 1958. 
 
Kahlo's career as an artist began in 1925 while she was bedridden and recovering from a tragic bus accident at age 18. The accident left her with serious injuries to her pelvis and back, which would require dozens of surgeries, leave her unable to have children and impact her health for the rest of her life. Kahlo finished her first self-portrait the following year while she was healing, and gave it to her boyfriend at the time.
 
In 1929, Kahlo married noted Mexican muralist Diego Rivera, who was 20 years her senior. Both were communists and the couple remained politically active throughout their tumultuous union, which included a divorce, remarriage and extramarital affairs on both their parts. Kahlo’s self-portraits often captured her personal pain, including her turbulent relationship, the devastating physical and emotional effects of her accident and several heartbreaking miscarriages. Some of her most well-known paintings channel this pain and were created when Kahlo was in her twenties and thirties, including Henry Ford Hospital (1932), The Two Fridas (1939) and The Broken Column (1944). Although many called her work surrealism, Kahlo rejected the label. Kahlo frequently said that she never painted dreams, but painted her own reality.
 
Kahlo’s work was exhibited in several group and solo art shows around the world throughout her lifetime. In 1953, her first solo show in Mexico lifted her spirits during a deep depression brought on by her debilitating health problems. Kahlo was bedridden at the time of the Mexico City show, but arrived to the gallery in an ambulance and greeted visitors from a four-poster bed.
 
Kahlo’s health continued to decline and she died in 1954 from a pulmonary embolism, though some reports stated it was suicide. Hundreds attended her Mexico City funeral.
 
Valentina Tereshkova (1937-)
Valentina Tereshkova proved that a woman could venture into space just as well as any man when she became the first woman in space on June 16, 1963. Tereshkova was the first woman--and just the tenth person--in space when she orbited Earth as a Russian cosmonaut at age 26. In recognition of her contributions to space exploration, the Tereshkova crater on the moon is named after this trailblazing woman. 
 
Tereshkova was born in a small village in the Yaroslavl Oblast, Russia. In her early twenties, Tereshkova, then a factory worker, joined a nearby amateur parachute club and amassed a record 126 successful jumps. The Russian Prime Minister of that time, Nikita Khrushchev, wanted to send a woman into space before the United States, and a lack of Russian female pilots made female parachutists viable candidates. Tereshkova volunteered for the Russian space program and was selected to join.
 
After receiving an Air Force commission and training for 18 months, Tereshkova launched into space on June 16, 1963 aboard the Vostok VI. She orbited the Earth 48 times and was in space for just under 71 hours. Tereshkova’s space trip confirmed Soviet tests that women had the same resistance to the psychological and physical stresses of space as men. She was named a "Hero of the Soviet Union" on June 22 at the Kremlin and received several other awards and accolades.
 
On November 3, 1963, Tereshkova married fellow cosmonaut Colonel Andrian Nikolayev, who orbited the earth in 1962 in the Vostok III. Their daughter Yelena was born in 1964 and became the first child of parents who had both been in space.
 
Tereshkova went on to earn her doctorate in engineering, and later served as an aerospace engineer for the space program. She was also involved in Russian politics and culture, holding a number of positions, including a deputy in the Supreme Soviet, the head of the Soviet Women’s Committee, vice president of the International Woman’s Democratic Federation and chair of the Russian Association of International Cooperation. 
 
Be sure to check out part one and part two of this series. And read about this young woman who has chosen an unusual path for her career.
 
(Photo of Frida Kahlo & Diego Rivera circa 1932; credit: Carl Van Vechten)
 
Sources: Authors and Artists for Young Adults, Vol. 47; Contemporary Heroes and Heroines, Book III; Space Sciences