5 Phenomenal Innovators to Celebrate this Women's History Month

Frida Kahlo

Nickolas Muray
Frida Kahlo on White Bench, New York (2nd Edition), 1939
Throckmorton Fine Art

 

Frida Kahlo has become one of the most recognized Mexican painters of our time. Like many around the world, we're blown away by how surreal and personal her art is. At just six years old, she was diagnosed with polio which left her disabled, and years later, her pursuit of a medical degree was altered by a tragic accident that occurred when she was eighteen. Her injuries wouldn't allow her to pursue that path to being a doctor, so she took up painting. 

She put all of these unfortunate tragedies in her art, along with her love for her Mexican culture. She's known for her bright colors, her fifty-five self-portraits, and the iconic floral headpiece.

Frida Kahlo Craft Prompt

This craft prompt is inspired by the flower crowns Frida wears in some of her famous self-portraits. 

Theresa Secord (Penobscot) 

https://www.theresasecord.com/biography

A founding member of the Maine Indian Basketmakers Alliance, Theresa Secord (Penobscot) has inspired many worldwide to become weavers through her passion for sweetgrass basketry. 

Her expertise created more than 200 basketmakers and earned her the honor of being the first U.S. citizen to receive the Prize for Creativity in Rural Life from the Women's World Summit Foundation in 2003. She later received a National Endowment for the Arts National Heritage Fellowship in 2016.

https://www.theresasecord.com/carousel.php?galleryID=277899 

Theresa Secord (Penobscot) Craft Prompt

This craft prompt is inspired by simple weaving with everyday fuzzy sticks.

Yayoi Kusama

Yayoi Kusama in her studio, 2017.© YAYOI KUSAMA/COURTESY OTA FINE ARTS, VICTORIA MIRO, AND DAVID ZWIRNER

"The princess of polka dots," better known as Yayoi Kusama, is a Japanese artist who adds a dot spin to her paintings, sculptures, performances, and installations. 

Her love of dots started when she had a childhood hallucination that put her in a field of flowers that were all talking to her. Even more interesting is that the heads of the flowers were like dots that made her feel as if she was disappearing or, as she described, "self-obliterating" into a field of dots. This out-of-body experience led to her defining her stamp on art culture. 

Kusama uses marks and dots in most of her art to relive the feeling of melting into and becoming a part of a bigger universe, similar to that hallucination. She describes our world as "only one polka dot among a million stars in the cosmos." 

Yayoi Kusama Craft Prompt

Kusama's craft prompt is inspired, of course, by lots of DOTS in her bright, colorful paintings. 

Mae Jemison 

The 100 Year Starship Project launched with the mission to take humans beyond our solar system within the next 100 years, and Dr. Mae Jemison leads it. Her guidance will hopefully lead to the first successful journey of a human to another star by 2112.

Physician, engineer, educator, entrepreneur, NASA astronaut, and the first woman of color to go into space, Mae Jemison has solidified her spot in history ten times over. 

Mae Jemison Craft Prompt

Jemison's craft prompt is an ode to her inspiring achievements. 

We hoped you loved getting to know these incredible innovators as much as we did and hope you have a blast creating these prompts. Be sure to share your creations with us using #gomakestuff on social media. We'd love to see it and share it with our KMM family!