Hanako O’Leary was born and raised by her Japanese mother and American father in the American Midwest. She grew up speaking Japanese at home, but English in school and everywhere else.  Until Hanako turned 18, every year, for 2 months during the summer, her mother Sumiko brought her and her siblings back to their maternal home in the Seto Inlet Sea of Japan. This deeply influenced her spiritual beliefs, artistic voice, and feminine ideals. 

Building off this personal history, Hanako looks to Japanese folk traditions of the Setonaikai Islands as a basis for her artwork. Through handmade objects, installations, and storytelling, Hanako explores this relationship with her matriarchal lineage and the meaning of feminine power.

Hanako has been a working artist in Seattle since 2011. She is one in a long line of Japanese women to leave home on her own terms and live her own odyssey.