A former director of museums dedicated to Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera in Mexico Metropolis has accused the belief that oversees these two establishments of years of mismanagement.
In an announcement to the Artwork Newspaper, which first reported information of Soto’s claims, the belief stated the previous director by no means formally reported considerations in regards to the standing of the collections throughout her tenure.
Hilda Trujillo Soto, who led the 2 museums between 2009 and 2020, made her allegations public in an in depth weblog submit printed in early April. She alleged that the trustees didn’t correctly tackle a discrepancy of their information centering round Kahlo and Rivera works which will have gone lacking. Soto claimed that these works later appeared, with out clarification, in personal collections in america.
The museums’ collections function with a protected standing underneath Mexican nationwide heritage regulation and are ruled by a belief that was established in 1955 by Rivera, Kahlo’s husband. That belief is now administered by Mexico’s central financial institution, Banxico.
Soto claims that Mexican officers haven’t responded to a number of written and in-person requests she’s made since 2020 for audits of monetary and historic information associated to the museums’ collections.
She additional alleged that supplies associated to Kahlo’s private diary have been misplaced, as have artworks catalogued as a part of a listing checklist from 1957, together with work titled Frida in Flames and The Abortion. Soto speculated that these works have been bought privately and illegally.
She asserted that Mexico’s central financial institution had violated authorized requirements round how Rivera’s property is ruled. “Sixty-nine years after Diego Rivera’s donation to the ‘Individuals of Mexico,’ Banxico has failed to satisfy the mandate it accepted to safeguard the museum collections that home a part of the nationwide heritage, which is essential to understanding the historical past, id, and reminiscence of our nation,” she wrote.
Banxico officers couldn’t be instantly reached for touch upon Trujillo’s claims.
The belief is at present getting ready a significant touring exhibition on Kahlo alongside the Museum of Nice Arts, Houston, and Tate Trendy. It’s unclear whether or not Soto’s claims will impression that exhibition.
