Born in Sendai, Japan, Betty Nobue Kano came to the U.S. when she was five with her Nisei mother Elsie, Issei father Toshio and sister Susan Tatsuko. During the first six years of school, Betty attended six different schools in Richmond, El Cerrito and Berkeley, California, and Cambridge, Massachusetts. She received her M.A. and M.F.A. in painting from U.C. Berkeley and her B.A. from San Francisco State. She’s the mother of Nina Fallenbaum and Malcolm Donaldson and resides in Berkeley, California.

In the last 25 years Betty Kano has exhibited her work in nearly 200 regional and national gallery and museum exhibitions including San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; Triton Museum of Art, San Jose; Reno Museum of Art; Marjorie Barrick Museum of UNLV; Doizaki Gallery, JCCC, Los Angeles; Mary Porter Sesnon Gallery, UC Santa Cruz, and the University of Illinois at Springfield and in international festivals, including at the Havana Bienal and Tijuana Cultural Center. Betty’s artwork is included in: "This Bridge Called My Back: Writings by Radical Women of Color"; "The Asian Pacific American Heritage: A Companion to Literature"; "Women Artists of Color: A Bio-Critical Sourcebook to 20th Century Artists in the Americas"; "Black Velvet, the Art We Love to Hate" by Jennifer Heath; "Mixed Blessings" by Lucy Lippard; and "The Forbidden Stitch."

Betty Kano has curated 15 exhibits, most during her nearly six year tenure as Executive Director of Pro Arts, a nonprofit gallery in Oakland, CA. She is a Lecturer in the San Francisco State University Ethnic Studies Dept. She is a co-founder of Godzilla West (an Asian American arts network), Asian American Women Artists Association and Women of Color Camp, Art Against Apartheid (1984), Hands Off Cuba (1980's), and AWOL, Artists and Writers Out Loud (1991). She is a participant in Berkeley Genyukai and Ryukyu Damashii, an Okinawan music group. Among the awards she has received is the "Sisters of Fire" award in 2002 by Women of Color Resource Center in Oakland, Rockefeller Foundation Residency Fellowship in the Humanities in 1991-1992 and awards in painting, including SECA Finalist (1981, 1982), Exhibition Award, San Francisco Arts Festival (1977).