Chanina Luwisz Szejnbejn was born in 1927 in Zofiówka. In 1936, while still a child, he emigrated with his family to Brazil. He settled in Belo Horizonte, where he completed his medical studies at the Federal University of Minas Gerais (UFMG) . In parallel, he developed a passion for art, studying at the Academy of Fine Arts under Guignard and Franz Weismann . His first solo exhibition was held on 11 March 1961 at the headquarters of the União Israelita in Belo Horizonte .

From the outset, Chanina's work attracted critical interest, particularly from Mário de Moraís , who was the first to write about the artist and provide an interpretative framework for his oeuvre. Morais saw in his art a deep poetry and restlessness and at the same time a spontaneous need for expression, comparing his painting to Chagall's spirituality.

"His Jewish background, his education and life in Minas Gerais, and his profession as a doctor: at the confluence of these forces, the painter Chanina creates a strongly humanistic, dense and dramatic work, imbued with a particular sensitivity" - wrote Márcio Sampaio again about him .

At the centre of Chanina's paintings is the human being, usually a woman, and nature: birds, flowers, animals. In his painting Três Mulheres ('Three Women'), the artist depicts three figures with different complexions: a white, a mulatto and a black woman, as the symbolic embodiment of the Brazilian national myth, based on the idea of the 'three races' that make up the country's identity. This composition, in intense colours, is characterised by a calm and static quality, different from the dynamic scenes known from the work of Di Cavalcanti or Gauguin , to which his work has often been compared.

The repetition of motifs in Chanina's paintings, i.e. female faces with similar features, symbolic arrangements of colours and forms, gives his works an almost mythical character. The woman in his paintings is not so much a portrait as a sign: an embodiment of the combination of nature and spirituality, corporeality and poetry.

Chanina's work fits into the broader context of Brazilian artistic life in the second half of the 20th century, in which art salons played a key role in the process of legitimising artists. His presence in these environments demonstrates that the artist was seeking his own path, independent of the dominant currents, but in dialogue with tradition and the present.

Chanina worked as a professor of painting at the school, teaching at Escola Guignard in Belo Horizonte . In 1984, he was awarded the Inconfidência Medal, awarded by the State of Minas Gerais to those distinguished for their contribution to the culture of the region. His works have been exhibited many times. Not only in Brazil.