Heart Evangelista paints beauty, heartbreak and change
‘A lot of people tell me that my paintings are sad-looking, but they’re actually more pensive than sad. They’re very colorful and that says a lot about my disposition in life, how I’m very hopeful,’ says Heart.
SINGAPORE — Seeing Heart Evangelista as an artist is like meeting her again for the first time. At Chan Hampe Galleries in Raffles Hotel Singapore where six of her artworks are displayed, Love Marie Ongpauco stands in the corner of the room, a ball of jitters and excitement. She shies away from the crowd, makes a nervous face and actually grunts. “I don’t know what I’m going to say,” she tells us. She is accustomed to people looking at her — a beautiful face that has grown up in the limelight — but today she feels most exposed, exhibiting her work internationally for the first time.
The Ambassador of the Philippines to Singapore, Antonio Morales, is delivering introductions. Morales tells guests that Heart is a famous celebrity in the Philippines, as well as soon-to-be wife of a senator — Heart smiles through the preliminaries, clasping her hands together. Few have seen the actress this nervous. When she is called to the stage, she transforms with the grace of the women in her paintings, her trademark symbolic mosaics hanging glorious in the background.
Cream Silk, for which Heart has been an endorser for 16 years, has organized Heart’s first exhibit outside the Philippines called “Love Marie: A Solo Exhibition of a World Class Filipina, Love Ongpauco,” her third solo exhibit to date. In 2014, the brand introduced the #BeyondBeautiful campaign, and now continues by celebrating the Filipina’s beauty and talents as worthy of the world. During Heart’s brief speech, she goes on about being Filipino and having a positive outlook in life — a trait that is contrasted with the forlorn expressions of the women in her paintings. None of these women are her, she tells us. In the age of the selfie, Heart has created only one self-portrait, “Angel Whisper,” where another girl is whispering in her ear. You’ll know which one she is by the long, black hair (a very Creamsilk touch, that one). “Maybe she’s my conscience, but Lovi (Poe) keeps saying that’s her telling me bad things,” she jokes.
Having had an actress’s life of contracts and commitments, one could say that Heart’s fairly recent foray into art has also turned out to be her unshackling. She was a closet artist who started painting as a child, but never really came out until she posted one of her works on Instagram early last year. “I never expected anything from it. I remember I uploaded on Instagram and some people said, ‘Ang pangit ng painting mo.’ I have all these bashers! But what I learned is, whether they like it or don’t like it, just keep painting. It just takes one person to appreciate it, and the magic begins,” she says. It is refreshing to have an actress so candid, but she’s not just an actress anymore anyway.
This magic that she speaks of all happened in 2014 when she had two major solo, sold-out exhibits, one at ArtistSpace in Ayala Museum, and another at Galerie Joaquin. For her first exhibit, she showed 19 artworks, all sold-out, and all painted some time between 2013 and 2014. “Nung na-depress ako, natapos ko bigla lahat,” she says. “My work has to do with what I was going through at that time. I was fighting with my parents and going through that whole shift of being independent. I could relate to the canvas. It was very therapeutic for me. It also has a lot to do with being Filipino. A lot of people tell me that my paintings are sad-looking, but they’re actually more pensive than sad. They’re very colorful and that says a lot about my disposition in life, how I’m very hopeful.
“When I first posted on Instagram, I was overwhelmed because I had good reviews. It was nice because it was something people didn’t expect of me, something that I always kept to myself. It was nice for people to see a different side of me, because people think when you’re an artista, you’re medyo kulang-kulang. You’re never good enough. Intellectually, you’re not challenging. I felt like I was a bit more respected when I started to paint. It was like revealing my diary, but in a different language. It was something that was mysterious about me,” she shares.
Mystery is one thing that is consistent in Heart’s work — mystery and the girl. Being an actress, Heart says she expresses well with the girl. “They’re different characters that represent certain emotions. ‘Fallen Star’ is my favorite. It looks like she’s in a play and it has something to do with the ups and downs of being in showbiz. The girl would represent emotions, like heartbreak or frustration. She’s not me, but she’s what I was feeling at that time,” she says, adding, “Of all the celebrities my age, (Heart is 29,) I think I’ve been through the worst controversies and gossip and I’ve learned to just not care so much about what people think. I like myself. I love myself. If just one person out of the 100 who are following me likes my paintings, then I’ve made a difference.”
Her outlook reveals that this is her newfound love, one that she will not quit anytime soon — especially since getting into it, truly pursuing it as a career, has taken a lot of guts, as well as a little bit of prodding from her soon-to-be-husband. “Before, I would just paint on a small canvas, but Chiz (Escudero) was like, ‘Why don’t you just paint on a big canvas? Just go for it.’ It was the same as what I was going through — I just had to face life and be brave and when I finished my first painting, ‘Love’s First Blossom’ (now owned by Ronald Singson and also the favorite painting of Heart’s dad,) I felt so liberated. It was the same thing as what I was going through. I was learning to handle my own money, do the groceries, deal with the everyday grind.”
Alongside her career transformation is also a personal one. Heart had just finished high school, which is something that she has always promised she’d do. “Lately I’ve had a taste of real life. I just finished high school! I had intense tutoring for four hours every day early last year. Then I went to DepEd and I took the test, and I passed. So now I’m trying to go to college, but hindi rin biro yung work ko. I don’t want to go there and act like a diva, not really study. I really want to go to school. I’m not too old to become a vet — you never know! But I still have to balance that with other priorities.”
“I’ve become such a better person. I feel like a woman now, a real person with real issues and I love it. I’ve learned so much this past three years. I kind of like it more than acting. I’ve never really had a day off — I’ve only been allowed two weeks in one year. So I never really got to see the world. Now that I’ve experienced other things, I feel so hungry for more. I don’t really want to stay in that box — 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. of crying and laughing, crying and laughing. Showbiz has done so much for me, but I think I am a better person with what I am doing today,” she says.
Still, with her wedding to Senator Chiz in February, she has temporarily put painting on hold to savor the transition. Her acting career is undergoing a change as well, to suit the blossoming of a new phase in her life. “What I realized is I’m not marrying an artista. I’m not marrying a regular person. I’m marrying a senator nga pala, which I forget from time to time! So mali nga naman kung nakikipag-torrid kissing scene ako with kung sino-sino. You need to also be careful with your image because it reflects his image. So definitely there will be changes, but it would be for the better. And I think they would also be really good for me as an artist.”
Choosing the right roles will be one of these changes. She shares that she has recently been offered a mother role. “I’m not ready for a mother role. I could still stretch. Now you have the Jennylyn Mercados, who are moms in real life but not necessarily moms in their roles. I just want to do one soap a year, but a really nice one.”
It’s still apparent how this art thing, this new world that she had just entered at a dramatically fast pace and everything that comes with it, is only starting to sink in. She even gushes, “During my second exhibit, Sansó and Ramon Orlina cut the ribbon for me at Galerie Joaquin. Fernando Zobel has one of my paintings. It’s just amazing! Especially because for 16 or 17 years all I’ve been doing was cry or kiss some random guy on TV. It gives life more meaning for me and it’s changed me a lot.”
As the launch wraps up, Heart mingles with guests, a glass of wine in hand. Her crystal-encrusted nails twinkle from across the room. The question begs to be asked: How does she keep her nails in impeccable shape when she is painting all the time? “I wear doctor’s gloves when I’m painting. It bothers me a bit because I like to feel the texture, but I have no choice because sometimes I have work the next day, and I’m about to get married so there are always pictorials. When oil gets under your nails, it gets stuck there, so mukhang dirty nails!” she laughs. She also did her own makeup for the event, and with that, we get that Heart is not going to be the brooding, tortured kind of artist. Perhaps she’s had enough of that in her life. Maybe in her next painting, the girl will have a hint of a smile in her eyes — but fans of her work will have to wait a bit for that. Heart has a wedding to attend.
