Sentaro is a tattoo artist living and working in Kunming, the capital city of Yunnan province in China.
His tattoo designs roll together vivid scenes of stoner lifestyle, traditional Japanese tattooing, Eastern mythology and pop culture.
In an interview with the Leaf, Sentaro expressed that in China, there are a lot of people interested in this style of work; however, restrictions around the plant are much tougher than those we experience here in the U.S.
He sees the plant as something that is neither good nor bad, but something that is “natural, neutral and an original inhabitant of this planet.”
Sentaro got into the green scene back in 2011, he told the Leaf. As he put it, “My journey went from indifference to enjoyment and eventually to facing the consequences. Now, it serves merely as a spiritual totem for me.”
He continued, “My inspiration really exploded starting in 2024, with many ideas derived from friends and events around me.”
These are some of the examples you can see on his Instagram page: evil-looking preroll spirits, a kawaii one-eyed leaf on a schoolgirl’s body and a scene of a geisha using a grinder.
Sentaro told the Leaf, “Japanese culture has had a profound influence on me, stemming from my childhood impressions of anime and my professional style, which indirectly sparked an interest in ukiyo-e.” The term, which means “pictures of the floating world,” is a well-recognized style of Japanese art that depicts everyday people and life through colorful woodblock prints.
He brought up how almost all of the stoner art you find online or in galleries leans toward Western artists, styles and references. This is what “started me thinking about what fusing this with Eastern philosophy would look like,” he said.
Now, Sentaro said, he uses ukiyo-e as the framework for most of his work. The result is something he described as “both subtle and intriguing,” which feels insanely accurate.
Currently, he works out of a friend’s tattoo parlor in Kunming and travels abroad to work guest spots at other shops. When it comes to creating new ideas for a piece, Sentaro said he has three main approaches: working from a client’s experience, from the name of a strain or a character parody.
When it’s time for the studio to come alive with a new tattoo or just a sketch session, he throws on something chill like Japanese hip-hop group Namedaruma or Taiwanese rappers Soft Lipa and GorDoN.
“I like relaxing vibes; listening to them feels like that first big gulp of a cold beer at the start of the day,” Sentaro said.
