When Dyana’s father gave her his old 35 mm film camera in elementary school, her skinned knees and grass-stained clothes gave way to a quiet appreciation of aesthetic beauty.
A hard worker but a struggling student, Hesson found her gift of painting in an art class in college. She changed her major and studied art at Arizona State University where she developed her style of applying thin layers of oil paint with very little texture.
After graduating with honors, Dyana combined her newly found skills with the work ethic of her childhood, and soon art collectors eagerly invested in her radiant paintings. Known for her vibrant, large-scale oil paintings, Dyana often features singular plants in precise, minimalist compositions that elevate their beauty and form with scientific clarity and personal reverence. Each work is rooted in Hesson’s lived experience, with subjects discovered through hikes, ecological fieldwork, and restoration efforts across the west.
Her work is collected worldwide and her series, True Blue Arizona was featured in Arizona Highways Magazine in March 2020. Dyana is a Master of the Southwest award winner, Master Signature member of American Women Artists, and a founding member of the Art on the Wild Side art exhibit program at the Phoenix Zoo.
Dyana’s latest book The Art of Wildflowers was recently published by Arizona Highways. Her one woman show,“Wild Arizona” was exhibited at the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum in the fall of 2025.
Dyana lives in Mesa, Arizona with her husband Randy, daughter Sydney and Jack Russell terrier, Beau. She has a case of incurable wanderlust, and a love affair with God’s creation.
