Hi! I'm Ha Rika.
Welcome. Thank you for stepping into my world for a moment.
I'm a Vietnamese artist and designer based in Bangkok.
I make things from my humble home studio, where I’ve somehow ended up with a creative practice that doesn’t fit neatly into one niche.
I’ve never really wanted to choose between art and design. They ask different things of me, but I need both.
Art keeps me looking. It slows me down enough to notice the things I might otherwise miss: a gesture, a tension, a strange little detail, the feeling something leaves behind. It keeps my eye curious and my way of seeing open.
Design keeps my hands busy and my mind moving. I enjoy the problem-solving side of it: looking at what isn’t working, asking why, and figuring out what could work better.
For me, the two have to go hand in hand. Making art keeps the designer in me from becoming too practical. Designing keeps the artist in me from disappearing into my own head. One feeds the other, and together they shape how I see the world.
I have a BFA in Industrial Design from the University of Industrial Fine Art in Hanoi, and I’ve spent the past 14 years working across brand strategy, communications, campaigns and design, while continuing to make art alongside it all.
Whatever I’m making, I tend to come back to the same thing: the human being underneath it.
A person, a brand, an object, a story. I’m interested in what makes something feel like itself. The details, contradictions, imperfections and little truths that make us recognise something as real.
That’s probably why I’ve never been very interested in making things that are simply beautiful or simply useful. I want to make things that connect. Things that make you look twice, feel something, recognise yourself, or see someone else a little differently.
That’s what Ha Rika Being is for.
A place where art, design and curiosity can live alongside each other. A practice of looking closely, making with my hands, and trying to uncover a little more of what it means to be human.
