Wollongong artist Hollyeva had a buyer call her up to congratulate her for having her designs in an Australian-owned furniture company. Her emotions were mixed.

‘’It was really bittersweet. Happy and sad at the exact same time. I was so thrilled that my ‘designs’ had made it to a huge company but I hadn’t painted them,’’ she said. ‘’I had to be smart and honest and take my emotions out of the situation so I contacted the manager of the store.’’

She politely asked the manager when she was going to be paid for all of the art he was selling.

Very apologetic, the manager said he would take all the designs down off their shelves. ‘’I was really quite nice about it and said ‘no need to do’, that I understand business is business and my art would only be tracked back to an Asian family trying to make a living which would break my heart so I simply said ‘work with me, I am the real deal’,’’ she explained.

She informed the manager all was not lost – he now had access to the artist behind the designs that he obviously loved so much and she offered to work with him.

With that, the pair developed a good relationship. ‘’We are currently going through negotiations in getting my work into their store.’’

Hollyeva learnt a powerful lesson through that process.

‘’No matter how hard anyone tries to paint my works of art they simply cannot,’’ she said. 

‘’They can get close but it won’t hold the emotion that I have placed into the artpiece so people will be disappointed in getting a rip-off version of Hollyeva.’’

A common piece that is constantly being copied and reproduced by big manufacturers is Uluka, her owl.

The owl has flown into so many businesses but often it has been without Hollyeva signing the work or giving her permission.

‘’Do I want to go down the path of legal suing and finding out what parts of the globe are copying Hollyeva?

‘’My answer to this for now is no. I wish to work with these large department stores so they can get the art right.

‘’My art has an emotion to it and the copies just don’t have that feeling of beauty.

‘’By copying my owl from my website then to have another artist try and paint it just doesn't work out. 

‘’No-one can be Picasso or Ken Done there’s only one of them, just like my art there’s only one of me.’’

It got her thinking.

‘’I wanted to supply them with my artwork while keeping it Australian made.’’

Her search across the country led her right back to her own doorstep. She found Brent Rasmussen from PhotoMart in Shellharbour.

Brent is a printing and framing artisan - with the only Hahnemuhle Certified Studio on the South Coast.

‘’He photographs my paintings and faithfully re-creates them as fine art prints, then sends them to my buyers across the globe,’’ Hollyeva says.

‘’Boom! As we keep saying when we produce beautiful fine art that is 100 per cent Hollyeva.’’

Her dad named her after a coastal bay in Hawaii called "Haleiwa". That is how Hollyeva was born ‘’and I feel blessed’’.

‘’My dad would say it was one of the most beautiful places he had ever seen filled with country ambience as well as cool surf shops and art galleries,’’ she says.

‘’My dad has passed away now and I feel I carry a lot of his soul with me.

‘’Since his passing my mum urged me to open up my own art gallery in Wollongong.’’

Hollyeva’s journey wasn't always about being a full-time painter. Looking back she has always honoured her passions - dance, music, travel and art.

She has worked hard in the retail industry but no matter what, she has always made time to honour her imagination.

‘’I would honour it by picking up a paint brush and allowing myself to simply paint,’’ she explains. ‘’I would dive headfirst into my imagination and then it would just take over.

‘’When I am in this place there are no rules and I give myself permission to paint whatever I want and mistakes are welcomed.

‘’I realise that it’s the mistakes that I make that are the most important parts to my artworks. 

‘’The mistakes turn into birds and shapes that wouldn't have happened if I was trying to be perfect. 

‘’I am completely being myself and adding any colours that I choose. It’s really beautiful to feel 100 per cent me.’’

Over the years Hollyeva has realised something incredible.

‘’When you honour your true self there is a lot of peace and harmony there, alongside beauty and a feeling of being real.’’

‘’The world can be a place where you lose yourself to what society expects of you. You can get lost in being a certain way, wearing a certain thing and eating certain foods - that's why painting for me pulls me back into my soul, and there I know what to wear, what to eat and how to be.’’

Hollyeva says her paintings are becoming really popular not by chance or fate, but by her being herself.

‘’It’s as simple as that. I have stood in my truth as a painter and I have shared my love of life for many years and my dreams have all caught up with me.

‘‘This has been a natural process like grass growing naturally. You cannot force the grass to grow by telling it to, It just grows naturally.’’

Hollyeva’s art gallery is at 119 Crown street or visit  www.hollyeva.com