Biography
Mary Grey is an Irish printmaker based at Graphic Studio Dublin, working in etching, aquatint, linocut, photo-intaglio, and mokuhanga (Japanese water-based woodblock printing). Born in 1948 in Dublin, she came to printmaking as a second career: she earned a BA from University College Dublin in 1972, completed teacher training at the Froebel College of Education in 1979, and worked as a primary teacher until her retirement in 2005.
From 2000 onward she pursued formal art education through evening, weekend, and summer classes at NCAD, IADT, the National Gallery of Ireland, and Trinity College Dublin, building a portfolio across drawing, watercolour, acrylic, oil painting, photography, and Irish art history. She discovered printmaking specifically in 2008 via a summer course at NCAD and joined Graphic Studio Dublin in 2009, where she has continued developing across multiple print techniques. Her work is described as inspired by nature and her surroundings, particularly Irish coastal landscape (Skerries Harbour series) and natural-history botanical subjects (Magnolia Galaxy, Cherry Blossom, A Greedy Bee).
Grey's mokuhanga 'Pick of the Bunch' (26 × 18 cm) was selected for the Kanreki exhibition mounted by Graphic Studio Dublin to mark its 60th anniversary, the cohort organised around a brief that all participating artists incorporate the colour red. The exhibition was shown at The Model, Sligo (2020), Graphic Studio Gallery, Dublin (April 2021), and travelled to the 9th International Mokuhanga Conference satellite event at Nara Prefectural Cultural Hall (30 November to 4 December 2021). A second documented mokuhanga, 'An Oasis of Calm' (18 × 20 cm, €220), continues the natural-subject vocabulary in the water-based woodblock register.
Her Graphic Studio Dublin artist page lists works ranging from small etchings (12 × 13 cm) to medium-scale aquatints and photo-intaglios (20 × 30 cm), with mokuhanga appearing as a smaller component of the broader catalogue. Her prints address a recurring contemplative-pastoral subject vocabulary — small-craft harbours, garden bees, blossom branches, drift-line shoreline studies — produced at modest editions (typically 30-50) and small to medium scale.
For Hanga's purposes, Mary Grey qualifies as a verified Irish printmaker with Graphic Studio Dublin membership since 2009, multiple documented mokuhanga works, and selection for the Kanreki 2020-21 exhibition.
Key Facts
- Active Period
- 1948
- Nationality
- 🇮🇪Ireland
- Movement
- Contemporary Mokuhanga
- Subjects
- Still Life
- Works Indexed
- 1
Frequently Asked Questions
Mary Grey is an Irish printmaker based at Graphic Studio Dublin, working in etching, aquatint, linocut, photo-intaglio, and mokuhanga (Japanese water-based woodblock printing). Born in 1948 in Dublin, she came to printmaking as a second career: she earned a BA from University College Dublin in 1972, completed teacher training at the Froebel College of Education in 1979, and worked as a primary teacher until her retirement in 2005.
Mary Grey was active born in 1948. They were associated with the Contemporary Mokuhanga movement.
Mary Grey's work was shaped by the Contemporary Mokuhanga tradition in Japanese woodblock printmaking. Contemporary Mokuhanga: Contemporary mokuhanga (literally "wood-block print") encompasses artists working from approximately 1970 to the present who continue or reinvent traditional Japanese woodblock printing techniques.
Mary Grey's prints frequently feature still life.