The two-woman art exhibit by friends, Solenn Heussaff and Olivia D’aboville, threaded their creativity together into masterpieces they call their own. 

On Dec. 10, 2024, republicasia was invited to VĪTA, by artists Solenn Heussaff and Olivia D’aboville. It was held in the Provenance Gallery at Shangri-la The Fort in Taguig City.

The exhibit not only showcases an artist and her works but of two artists, their own artworks, and their collab masterpieces. Solenn Heussaff and Olivia D’aboville who have known each other since childhood and became classmates in art school, have joined hands in weaving their artistic styles into a series of collaborative pieces of art. Solenn Heussaff, well-known for being an actress and model, is also known as a muralist and painter who displays social realism themes through her paintings. In VĪTA, her collaboration with her best friend, she explores a new way to express a new style and themes in her artistic process. Olivia D’aboville, a textile designer and expert in the field, reveals the intricacies of visual textures and how using the right material produces and tells a story in her designs. From choosing the right material, threading, designing, and executing, she also showcases the intertwining of her art with Solenn Heussaff’s work. 

A seamless weaving of art styles, Solenn and Olivia are also joined by their art curator Stephanie Frondoso. “Together, Heussaff and d’Aboville have created little worlds that blend comfort in the familiar with a shared hope in the unknown. Activated by their own simple, everyday joys, they have accessed nature as therapy, translating this into their work with the aim of renewing and repairing both the natural environment and the fabric of society.”

Every time we go and view paintings or any piece of artwork in museums or galleries, they are always open to different interpretations whether we know their backgrounds or not. But in this case we took the chance and directly asked one of the artists about the whole exhibition.

“Basically, it’s life-long friends coming together to showcase things that we really believe in. Olivia’s always been an advocate of supporting women communities and I’ve always painted the kind of put forth stories of people that don’t get to speak up and I think, together, our works, you can really see it. 

We decided to collab because we were at the same stage of our lives and I guess also being mothers, we have that touch of femininity or a different way of communicating things or seeing things. We really wanted to put forth change, basically, ‘cause we’ve gone through so many changes as friends, we’ve gone through changes in our lives, personally – whether it be beautiful or ugly – they’ve formed us to who we are.”

“Which is why we called our exhibit VĪTA – it’s life, it’s the constant change in life, the constant growth, depending on the things you go through”

Solenn Heussaff also shared with us their collaboration process.

“For the process of collaboration, I actually approached Olivia in January saying that I was going to have an exhibit soon and I wanted it to be a duo show – my first duo show – and of course, who to do it than with your best friend and someone you trust so much, and someone that you also respect as an artist. 

So I started painting on my own and then we met up for colors when she started weaving her fabrics. “Let’s meet,” so that our colors combine, and then we started seeing how we could actually have both our works into one and I had seen in Olivia’s past exhibits that she had printed on some of her abaca, but small details, so I said, “What if we print the whole abaca?” which is what we did, so I made an artwork and then we stretched it on Photoshop for it to reach 10-15 yards, and then, her artisans pleated it after to bring the painting to its original form, and then, I reworked on top of the painting after it was stitch in the canvass with ink, so you’ll see glittery effect sometimes – that’s the ink – to kind of emphasize some areas, and then I worked on doing a frame to put everything together into one piece.” 

The exhibit is open to the public until January 5, 2024.