You can see that the title, A Few Small Nips is quite the understatement.

The painting refers to a quote by a man standing trial for stabbing his wife to death in a drunken rage after finding out about her extramarital affair. When speaking to the judge he said, “But all I did was give her a few small nips!” This might have been OK in the Monty Python and the Holy Grail “it’s merely a flesh wound” scene, but it definitely didn’t work here. No one found stabbing your wife to death the least bit funny.

Frida was obviously disturbed by this story but she also felt strangely connected to it. The newspaper article about the incident came out around the same time that Frida found out about Diego’s most unchill affair of all - the one with Frida’s younger sister Christina. This news, to Frida, felt like she was being stabbed in the chest. Who could blame her? The affair lasted a year and there was nothing Kahlo could do to stop it, though it broke her heart. She chopped off all of her hair and purposefully began dressing in clothes that Diego wouldn’t like. She also began painting some of her most brutal works, A Few Small Nips being the pinnacle of pain. “Frida had it framed in smooth wood, which she gouged and sprinkled with small drops of red paint. It is as though the blood was spattered outside of the limits of the frame into the world of the spectator, who becomes an eye-witness to the event.” The pain in this nightmarish work is tangible and leaves you feeling vulnerable, and icky all over. Have fun trying to sleep tonight...and don't do it with your wife's sister!