Chanit (pronounced ha-neat), a New-York-based artist , maintains her studio in Midtown Manhattan. She was born in Czechoslovakia during the Second World War and came to the United States in 1960.

Chanit studied drawing with Joseph Hirsh and painting with Harvey Dinnerstein at the National Academy of Fine Art and Design on scholarship. By then, Chanit's involvement with painting grew into a passion for art (especially portraits in oil and watercolor). She also studied with Robert Phillip at the Art Students League and was privately mentored by Anthony Toney.

Chanit was a resident artist at Gurney's Inn in Montauk in the summer of 1982 and taught portraiture at Guild Hall Museum in East Hampton, Long Island, New York the following fall and spring. Her motto — “Portraits of people, places and favorite things" — extends to include states of mind, emotional landscapes, and energetic abstracts (derived from her tumultuous past) to the quiet contemplation of delicate flowers.