Hanna CheriyanVarghese

7 Apr 1938 – 12 June 2009

Hanna Cheriyan Varghese was a Malaysian Christian artist.  She started her career as an art and English teacher. She was also a wife, mother and grandmother.   Hanna used to say that as a visual artist, she did not get enough hours to paint and batik-dye as other demands of daily life usurped her time.

Hanna worked with different medium like oil colours, metal-tooling and wood-block printing. Her passion was  painting with Acrylic on canvas and batik-dyeing in fabric. Hanna described batik-dyeing as, “ an element of surprise and wonder in dyeing. The colour is deep when the fabric is wet. When it dries it takes on a lighter shade. Finally the result of colour on colour is amazing when a new hue emerges.”

From the early eighties, Hanna began expressing her faith, spiritual thoughts and experiences together with Biblical imageries into tangible form. She was inspired by the artwork created by the many Asian Christian artists in the IMAGE Magazine, and subsequently meeting many of them.

Hanna set-up this web site because she had many requests from individuals and organizations who wanted to use her artwork in their workshops and publications.  Her family would like to maintain this website so that her artwork can be easily and conveniently viewed.  Click here to view the Art Collection.

Send an email to her daughters Georgina Varghese at givili@yahoo.com or Johanna Varghese at johannavarghese@gmail.com for more information or to seek permission.

Acknowledgement

Hanna’s family wish to thank Clare Law for her invaluable help, expertise and patience in making the digital images, organizing and setting up these web pages.