A Hundred Shades of Ink of Edo By The Scottish Printmaker Paul Binnie

Paul Binnie (b. 1967) is a Scottish artist who belongs to the modern followers of the woodblock printing technique. The genres of his interest are yakusha-e (kabuki actor prints), fukeiga (landscape prints), and bijinga (pictures of beautiful women). Apart from woodblock printing, Paul Binnie works with a number of media such as stencil, etching, lithograph, graphite, ink, oil, pastel, and watercolor. In the current article, we'll examine one of his most popular sets of woodblock designs, A Hundred Shades Of Ink Of Edo, which Binnie created from 2004 to 2015.

Fig. 1. Paul Binnie, 2017 (Wikipedia.org)

Fig. 2. Comparison of contemporary world fashion by Binnie, 2015 (binniecatalogue.com)

Fig. 3. Kabukicho (Tokyo's entertainment district); scholten-japanese-art.com

Fig. 4. Maiko In Kyoto (binniecatalogue.com)

Avid Collector

Paul Binnie began his way in art by studying art history at the University of Edinburgh. Along with art history, he studied painting and etching at Edinburgh College of Art from 1985 to 1990. Having attained his master's degree, Binnie relocated from Edinburgh to Paris, where he worked as an art teacher at the Ecole du Louvre and the Atelier Hourde. The artist's enthusiasm for ukiyo-e emerged already in the years of studies in Edinburgh and urged him to collect prints. As time went on, the interest in Japanese printing tradition grew, and, in 1993, Binnie traveled to Tokyo to become a printmaker. Until the end of 1998, he lived in Tokyo and studied woodblock printing under the mentorship of Seki Kenji, master printer of Doi publisher. Binnie's fascination with kabuki and yakusha-e was caused by his location in the capital of Japan: the artist lived in Sendagaya, not far from the National Noh Theatre.

Fig. 5. Sleeping Woman, jigsaw woodblock, 2004 (binniecatalogue.com)

Fig. 6. Sleeping Boy, 1997, jigsaw woodblock, 1997 (binniecatalogue.com)

Acknowledged Printmaker

In 1998, Binnie moved to London and opened his printing studio, where he specialized not only in kabuki prints but also in landscapes and bijinga, making references to well-known ukiyo-e oeuvres. In 2004, Binnie resumed the series of tattoo depictions that he started to work on in Japan. These images would