Diana Hansen-Young was born in Bellingham, Washington in 1947. In 1966 she relocated to Hawaii. Mesmerized by the tropical beauty and climate of the islands, she settled down there, and was soon joined by her parents and siblings. In 1968 Young ran for the for the State Constitutional Convention. She won by a small margin of 93 votes. Her campaign platform was considered to be down-to-earth and very grassroots. Young then ran for the Hawaii State House of Representatives, and won a seat, but lost a Congressional race. afterwards she stated: "I was unemployable." Taking spare pieces of canvas and matting from her parents' frame shop, she began painting scenes of Diamond Head with a variety of of waves, rocks, and palm trees. To make a living she sold them along the roadside. Young kept painting Hawaiian women over the next 25 years. Eventually her roadside stand developed into a business and gallery. Young sums up the focus of her painting in these words: "The Hawaiian women I paint are a mixture of culture, race, and time, a blend of ancient Polynesians and the haole, Japanese, Chinese, Filipino, Samoan, and Portuguese women who followed."