Viva Hanu is an architect and designer turned artist, mother of three, living and working in Bielsko-Biala, Poland.
Her creative journey began with founding Ciao Stories, a Mediterranean-inspired clothing line celebrating colour, light, and ease. Drawing on her architectural training and eye for harmonious form, she crafted garments that echoed sunlit shores and effortless style. Yet she found herself longing for an outlet that allowed for more immediate, tactile exploration beyond seams and fabric.
In 2023 in search of rejuvenation, she picked up a brush and began experimenting with paint as a personal retreat from the demands of running a fashion label. Her intuitively created, color-rich canvases quickly attracted a following online and at pop-up exhibitions. In 2025, she made the bold decision to close Ciao Stories and devote herself entirely to the freedom of painting.
Untrained in formal techniques, she leans on what she calls her “creative intelligence” to guide each work, layering vibrant pigments with spatulas and custom tools until textures rise in bold relief. Her color-saturated abstracts and geometric compositions celebrate both visual impact and physical presence, inviting viewers not just to see, but to touch and feel the dynamic interplay of hue and form.
I am fascinated by the vivid possibilities of color and the sensual world of texture. For me, color isn’t just a visual phenomenon—it is a living, breathing force that shapes mood, memory, and moment. I seek to immerse the viewer in its vibrancy: from saturated fields of pigment to the most subtle gradient, every hue is an invitation to feel.
My work exists at the intersection of two complementary worlds. In one series, I build up the surface with oil “pixels” — tiny square blocks of pure color that jut out from the canvas like tactile jewels. These angular textures beg to be touched, to be felt under your fingertips, and in doing so they transform a passive viewing into an intimate encounter. In a second series, color drifts and pools like clouds, flowing seamlessly from one tone into the next. These paintings invite the eye to wander, to discover new passages of shade and light, as colors pulse and metamorphose across the surface.
Together, these approaches speak to a deeper impulse: to awaken empathy through sensation and to remind us that art is not only seen, but experienced. I believe that when we allow ourselves to touch—and to be touched by—a painting, we open ourselves to the story it carries. My hope is that viewers, by engaging both vision and touch, will find moments of calm, wonder, and connection. In a world conditioned to scroll past, I offer these canvases as invitations to pause, to explore, and to rediscover the joy of pure feeling.