In 2007, some 53 years after Kahlo's death, 30 trunks were found containing paintings, etchings and more than 22,000 documents relating to Kahlo and her life with her husband, famed Mexican muralist Diego Rivera. A great find for art lovers, as Frida Kahlo is the second-most image sold in Mexico after the Virgin of Guadeloupe. The Bozar exhibition, containing nineteen paintings, an etching, six drawings, and a number of photographs is the first time some of these pieces have left Mexico.

Kahlo captured her turbulent life by painting what she knew best-- her own portrait. Wracked with health problems from a young age, first from polio and then from a severe bus accident that left her bedridden for many months, Kahlo transferred her pain onto canvas.

She married artist Diego Rivera when she was 22 and he was 43. He influenced her greatly, encouraging her to wear traditional Mexican dress, expressing Mexicanidad, a movement that identifies with the Mexican Revolution of 1910. Kahlo, who was born in 1907, even told people she was born in 1910, the year of the revolution.

Her relationship with Rivera would contribute to her work and also torment her-- she divorced Rivera in 1939, unable to deal with his infidelities, but they remarried a year later. As an adult she suffered several miscarriages, which she incorporated into her work. One lithograph on display in Brussels is her 1932 work, "Frida y el Aborto" [Frida and the Miscarriage]. 

"Painting made my life complete. I lost three children...painting was a substitute. I think working is the best thing," she once said.

Mi nana y yo (My nurse and I), Frida Kahlo, 1937 © Colección Museo Dolores Olmedo, Xochimilco, México

In addition to the 20 works by Kahlo, Bozar is presenting two other exhibitions simulatneously: Mundos Mexicanos, with 25 contemporary photographers, and Mexican Moderinisms, a look at Mexican architecture of the 20th century.

"Frida Kahlo y su Mundo" is at the Centre for Fine Arts in Brussels until 18 April.