My name is Francine Hervé but I prefer Abora. 

Abora is "thank you" in Bantu, thank you to life, thank you...like a mantra...Abora.

So I'll start with that, say thank you. 

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I was first born in France in 1961, and as long as I can remember, I have always painted. My parents were both amateur painters.they painted on  canvases which they cut out from  old linen sheets and made their frames, I smeared pieces of fabric with everything that came into my hands, clay soil, ashes, abandoned brushes...there wasn't a lot of money at home.

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In 1985, my license  with ethnology in my pocket, I'm going to live in Africa.

First big trip, first aesthetic shocks, second birth.  I discover the extraordinary plant textiles  rituals of the Kubas ethnic groups of Central Africa, the vegetable velvets of the Shoowas, the raffia loincloths, the Baka bark of the pygmies of Gabon, primary clothing in the making of which I assist, ritual loincloths, dancing  in the traditional ceremonies to which  I participate... transported.The dance of being and of the plant reveals the soul of the dancer, the plant then becomes super soul skin.. 

 I already had  the taste of time, the meaning of the sign, I then discover  tradition and  I learn respect for elders in villages far from everything.

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In 1999 I returned from Africa and set up my workshop in a very small village in the Pyrenees. I register with the Maison des Artistes where I obtain my professional status. family, happy life, I no longer paint but I bring back a treasure, I am rich in knowledge, my artistic approach is then structured around my kubas, beaten bark, mud fabrics...birth of bamboo hangings , ritual fabric totems, my benevolent entities, forest spirits.

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In 2013, I realized an old dream, teaching yoga. Then followed a series of trips to India and Nepal  .It is India, Mother India, which will give me another founding aesthetic shock. I discover the softness, the harmony, the beauty of silk. In addition to the material, I literally discovered color, I developed my method of painting on wild silk (I do not use a frame to stretch the silk, I enrich my paintings with pigments and gold) and  I started to paint like I had never done before (with real brushes but always on the fabric, and what a fabric!!!!). I harmonize, I juxtapose, I combine, I reveal...I rediscover the colors, I put everything back into balance. , in harmony, the shapes, the colors, the material.

Intimacy, interiority, my painting becomes  meditation .

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I would qualify  my ethno-contemporary art because it is nourished by all these influences, these countries with a still very living tradition, these knowing ethnic groups, these faces of Africa, Asia and Oceania  , these materials, these stories. Everything that contributed to who I am today. I am the song of the harps of deep Gabon, the dance-trance of the loincloths of the Congo, I have the culture of dreams like the aborigines; I carry within me the colors of India, the shimmer of silk, the rustle of temples on the banks of the Ganges, the grandeur of the Himalayas. My work brings people together, invites you to the ball, my paintings  play their little intimate music with which  the dancers  resonate because they have the same notes inside themselves.

 

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