‘We’re so intermeshed’: The art of sharing clothes, shoes – and even a phone

Artists Louise Jennison and Gracia Haby, both 47, share everything: their art making, their wildlife foster care, even their shoes and mobile phones. In fact, they’ve rarely spent a day apart in 24 years.

Gracia Haby (right): “We do our artwork and wildlife-caring as if the two of us are one and the same.”

Louise: People ask us all the time if we get sick of being with each other. Usually, we don’t cope when we’re separated. We’re really like a collective “One of Us” – with four legs, four arms and two heads.

I first saw Gracia at RMIT, where we were studying painting, in 1994. I just wanted to be friends with her, like, immediately. After art school, we got closer and trusted each other more. We had such a close friendship neither of us wanted to lose that. But then we became something even more important to each other.

We started making artists’ books [handmade, limited-edition pieces] together in 1999. Over 25 years, we’ve made 105 book titles and 150 zines. People think collaborations must be competitive, but we try to drop ego. What we make together is far better than what we make on our own.

Gracia is incredibly talented and sees the big picture. I once spent days binding a box to house an artist’s book. It seemed broken to me, but Gracia saw it as part of the process and said, “That’s fine. We’ll just collage a fish coming out of it.” It looked far better. This idea – “just stick a fish on it” – applies to many things in our lives. We can always fix something for each other.

I live with chronic, post-operative pain and wouldn’t have gotten through it without Gracia. She’s utterly aware of everything I’m feeling. If I have a pain flare and am worried about a deadline, she’ll say, “No, we’re on this.” She’s an extremely present person and I’m very lucky to be the one she chooses to be present with.

We did 10 years as RSPCA-trained foster carers for cats with medical complications. We never thought we could do wildlife care because we live in Fitzroy [in inner Melbourne], but now we have a flying-fox mentor called Bev. We look after possums, too, but the flying foxes are different: they look straight at you with their big brown eyes and connect with you completely.

Gracia’s always been totally dedicated to what she makes and does everything with integrity. We both think the world’s been filled up with rubbish, so if we’re going to add something, we’ve got to make it important. With The Remaking of Things [the pair’s giant collage of a rejuvenated flying-fox habitat on show in the NGV’s Melbourne Now], we knew this was a chance to have a huge audience. And flying foxes need as many people as possible to fall in love with them. Without them, our forests would collapse.

There are moments in life when you just know what you have to do. Gracia was one of those moments.

Louise Jennison

We were recently called out to rescue a flying fox that was caught in a kids’ soccer net. When you’ve got a precious threatened species in your hands, sometimes it’s like, “Can I do this?” Gracia says, “It’s okay. We’ll let them have a rest and approach this with fresh confidence.”

You know when something’s special and important. And I’ve always known Gracia’s that. There are moments in life when you just know what you have to do. She was one of those moments and the flying foxes were another.

Gracia: I don’t remember what I thought as a 19-year-old. The past is a cold, foreign landscape to me – we’re so much about the present. I only remember meeting Louise in the blur of art school. I responded to her loyalty, care and empathy. We always wanted to be around each other, you know, for the entirety of our lifetime journey. I remember thinking that if we pursued the romantic side of things, we might not be friends for the rest of our lives. But that was just nerves, foolishness. Then you just plunge in, and why would you not? You could miss everything.

Now we’re so intermeshed. We finish each other’s sentences. We share the same Instagram account, the same shoes. We share clothes and have similar tastes, except Louise wears dresses and you’ll never see me in a dress. She loves the freedom of a dress but, to me, a dress is the complete opposite. We have one mobile phone, partly for financial reasons so we could get a good one for our work, but also it just makes sense because we’re nearly always together.

One of the beautiful things is that you’ve always got each other.

Gracia Haby

People are always very keen to know who does what. But we don’t even see it like that. We each do an equal part. A digital collage is something we make side by side, every single step. It’s on the same computer – and while one person might move the mouse, it’s a conversation.

One of the beautiful things is that you’ve always got each other. You draw strength from the other person and can relax: your shoulders drop down from your ears. If one person is finding something hard, the other person lifts them up, then it just always stays in that sort of balance.

I think Louise has incredible determination, a selfless devotion to things bigger than herself. Her empathy, wanting to help other people, has always been there.

There are a few things that we do as separate people: Louise teaches the making of artists’ books at RMIT and I write about dance. But generally, we do our artwork and wildlife-caring as if the two of us are one and the same.

I can always rely on Louise’s positivity. In January 2022, we had a big, rolled-up collage that had been exhibited and we no longer needed it, so we dragged it out for the hard-rubbish collection. It was difficult to look at this physical lump lying out there waiting to be taken, not knowing what work would come next. But Louise knew that we needed to make space in the studio for new things to come. She didn’t see it as an end at all.

We never go to bed on an argument. We do clash, because we’re people, but you make sure you work through what’s upset you. And in a prickly moment, neither of us is afraid to tell the other to pull her socks up.

I only worry about our co-dependence when I think about the day when only one of us is left. But if it’s curtains for me first, I’d love to think of Louise charging ahead and doing all of the things – raising flying fox pups and chopping fruit for them – and taking me with her.

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