Born into an artistic family, Hoang Hai Anh soon came into contact with painting materials. From 1993 to 1998, he studied at Hanoi University of Fine Arts (now renamed as Vietnam University of Fine Arts) and was among the first painting students from the school to be trained in all three materials of painting included oils, lacquer and silk. Graduating in 1999, he spent two years teaching silk painting, then shifted to focus on professional artist career. In next two years, 2000 and 2001, Hai Anh focused on the theme of nude girls, then moved his concern to self-portraits and portraits of relatives, still-life and landscape. His works have a very strong expressive power, which often use strong colors and with vigorous brush strokes of thick oil paint of the Austrian Expressionism in the early twentieth century.