Born in 1934 in Trinidad, Paul Banning was educated at Clifton College, Bristol and the West of England College of Art, gaining NDD Honours qualifications. After obtaining a Commission in the Army he subsequently became a furniture designer. Redundancy in 1986 gave him the opportunity to start a new career painting. Using his design skills and the basic training at art school in drawing, taught by Victor Passmore, RA, he studied the great watercolour masters of the 18th and 19th Centuries. In 1986 he started teaching watercolour painting and organised courses in France, Italy, Holland, Greece, India and Dubai. His work has been entered in several competitions, such as the Singer and Friedlander Watercolour Competition and the RWS Summer Exhibitions. In 2000 Paul Banning won the most prestigious prize given by the sponsor of the exhibition, Freshfields. He also won the Llewellyn Alexander Gallery prize for the finest watercolour in the Royal Institute of Painters in Watercolour Exhibition at the Mall Galleries in 2002.