1 . When Mexican artist Frida Kahlo’s paintings were put on display in a gallery in London, it attracted much attention. A poet and essayist described her paintings as “a ribbon around a bomb”-a quote that went on to provide the title for a documentary about her life. Such a/an _________ comment about her work seems to _________ Kahlo had a big impact on the art world of her time. Sadly, this was not the _________.

Kahlo, born in 1907 in a suburb of Mexico City, was greatly affected by two terrible events early in her life. At the age of 7, she _________ polio. The disease _________ her foot so that it always pointed out, and caused her right leg to grow to a shorter length than her left leg._________, Kahlo’s spine and pelvis became twisted as she grew older. Then in 1925, she was riding in a school bus that was _________ in a traffic accident; her pelvis and back were broken in several places. Throughout the rest of her life, the artist underwent more than 30 _________, but nothing was able to cure the severe _________ in her back and leg. However, the accident did have an __________ side effect: it led Kahlo to begin painting. While lying in her bed recovering in her parents’ home, Kahlo taught herself to paint and created her first self-portrait.

Despite the tragic events in her life, Kahlo had a __________ for inspiring excitement, happiness, and drama wherever she went. She often wore elaborate native jewelry and bright clothing, making her a highly __________ student at school. She also __________ wore her hair tied up on top of her head with bright ribbons in the style of the native people of Oaxaca, Mexico. Her preferred fashion and hairstyle are __________ in the various self-portraits she painted.

Kahlo died in 1954 in her parents’ home. The final words in Kahlo’s diary were, “I hope the __________ is joyful-and I hope never to come back.”

2 . Emma Towers-Evans first picked up a pencil when she was just two years old and said her love for drawing originated from Free Willy, a film about killer whales. Emma loved drawing as a hobby during her childhood and teens, but never thought it could be a future career. But after attending the University of Surrey for music and sound-recording, she began drawing portraits (肖像) of people’s pets. Now she creates incredible portraits of people and animals which are so realistic that they look like photos.

As her success continued, Emma decided to focus on drawing full-time and set up her own website. Now the pencil artist sells her own original work and 25 percent of earnings from sales of her big cat series of prints go toward conservation charities like the Born Free Foundation and LionAid.

The 29-year-old often completes the drawings on a large piece of Al or A0 paper and estimates each piece of artwork can have upwards of 0.5 million individual pencil strokes (笔画). And it takes her up to 100 hours to draw an excellent hyper-realistic pencil drawing.

Since the pandemic lockdown, Emma has been making videos of her painting process and sharing them on TikTok, which have got 265,000 followers and 4.5 million likes. “The first one I posted was a time delay video of a portrait and I can’t believe how popular it has become. The comments and support I get are amazing,” the self-taught artist said. “It’s really exciting to see something come alive on the paper. It took me years of practice, patience, and dedication to get to where I am today. I think anyone can get to that level as long as they have the same determination and self-belief.”

3 . The question of whether it is possible to dissociate the artist from their work has been debated for a long time. Even though positive critical reviews about an artist’s behavior can improve their artistic accomplishments, people should treat artists as individuals who have lived apart from their work.

One of the reasons is that even artists have shortcomings. Like any other human being, an artist can err, and we cannot be severely judgmental of every person that falls into error. Cancel culture with endless criticism is concerned more with how we should disregard the artists when they make mistakes than with how their weaknesses can be used by the artists to create art that is unique.

Perhaps Kevin Hart’s words support this thought. He asks, “When did we get to a point where life was supposed to be perfect? Where people were supposed to operate perfectly all the time?” When people start seeing artists as human beings, they’ll see them for who they are and review their behavior not on the basis of their art but on the basis of their humanity.

It should be also noted that there are works of art that are inspired by the artist’s experience. For example, the themes in the Harry Potter books are so connected with J. K. Rowling’s wicked worldview that it is virtually impossible to distinguish the two from each other. Since canceling artists based on their worldview would mean the reception to their art will suffer, artists become tense and unwilling to express themselves, which will kill creativity, eventually leading to the death of art. Comedians, singers or painters who should be integrating contemporary issues with their works become boring, and art stops functioning as the social mirror it ought to be.

An artist who makes mistakes still has art with intrinsic (内在的) value, benefiting entire communities or cultures. For instance, when Kendrick Lamar launched his album and frequently used the F-slur in one of his songs, there was much-heated discussion. He was entirely mistaken in using the F-slur, but as an artist, he still had a wide-reaching impact on society. Similarly, one can respect the late Michael Jackson because of how he impacted pop music and the inclusion of black musicians in mainstream media despite his personal weaknesses, opinions, worldviews and associations.

While these artists may engage in their terrible behavior, the art they produce today may serve as an example for others to produce outstanding work in the future. Some would refer to this process as a cycle. Good art should, therefore, be judged due to its value and not the value of the artist.