If ever there was a man who defied the stereotypical image of the solicitor, it is Paul Beckett, of Mannin Chambers on the Isle of Man.

Beckett, a graduate of Oxford University who qualified in 1981, is a devotee of tattoo art. His passion is not, though, one conducted at arm’s length, out of mere idle curiosity. Beckett’s heavyweight frame is adorned from head to foot in tattoos.

“I first noticed the aesthetic potential of tattoos when I lived in Southsea in 1984,” Beckett, a leading trust practitioner, says, “but waited many years until I found an artist who could express what I wanted to achieve. In 1999 I met Phil Butterworth, at that time working in Douglas and today living and working in Norway. He said he ‘didn’t do blokes in suits’ and it took a year to persuade him to work for me. I was 43 when we began in 2000.”

Since then, Beckett has worked with Butterworth and another artist on a series of tattoos that, sans suit and tie, make him appear anything but a lawyer. Connoisseurs of white-collar boxing might recall Beckett’s appearance at the Mermaid Theatre, London, for his first bout in 2005, because of the fearsome appearance that the Manx solicitor cut as he climbed through the ropes. Beckett still enjoys boxing training and, as a cultured, erudite man, he can also list any number of intellectual pursuits. But his tattoos single him out as one of the law’s more unusual characters.

“The first ink was the head of a blind dragon,” says Beckett, whose portrait, by Michael Taylor RP, is part of the 2008 Exhibition of The Royal Society of Portrait Painters (www.mallgalleries.org.uk). “It has no particular significance in itself, but is a beautifully executed piece. From this came a sequence of pieces around my middle, signifying earth, air, water, fire and spirit. Gradually, as the work continued, the lines began to escape from the confines of the boxer-short limits in which they were originally contained and so my previously private ink became visible socially.”

The last piece Butterworth created for Beckett was the samurai on his back. Since then, Beckett was worked with John "Snoopy" Rainey, who lives and works in Glengormley, just outside Belfast (www.tattoosbysnoopy.com). Beckett explains that Rainey’s style is much more graphic than Phil’s, with an infinite patience – "I’ve sat for as long as 10 hours at a time for him”.

He continues: “We began with the dragon and the jinn on my chest, covering the pecs. Then came a full right sleeve – about 40 hours in total, over four intense days, two days each one month apart. The sleeve shows Japanese theatre masks, which symbolise for me the many disguises we are compelled or encouraged to wear in life.”

Beckett’s candour is illuminating, with his body art representing a number of different identities: “I’m a commercial lawyer with an international client base, but also a former heavyweight white-collar boxer, a qualified masseur, a law lecturer and a prison teacher, an author, an occasional film extra, a husband and father, a human (and LGBT) rights campaigner, an art collector and patron, and a committed Christian hoping to be ordained into the Anglican Church.”

Michael Taylor’s portrait was first discussed in 2004, originally for Beckett’s 50th birthday in October 2006. In the event, “light levels in a Manx autumn being what they are, we decided to postpone the work until last July. I sat for 30 hours, staring into a mirror in my wife’s gym at our home, listening to late Beethoven, Schubert and Messiaen. Michael played the same music when he returned to his home in Dorset to complete the work.”

Is Beckett pleased with the end result? “Certainly,” he says, without hesitation. “The portrait is in reflection, and layered with partly hidden meanings. The experience of staring at my own image for such a length of time was utterly cathartic.” Or, as he says about the image on his left thigh: “This is a Japanese Kabuki Theatre image from 1752 – the actor is taking off his costume armour, no longer the warrior but the man within. So too myself, as the lawyer becomes Paul at the end of each working day.”

Michael Taylor RP’s portrait of Paul Beckett of www.manninchambers.com has been shown on BBC One

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