The Dutch in Japan – Rin Shinhei, ca. 1800

“Hollander.” Woodblock print by Rin Shinhei, circa 1800. Sheet size: 30.3 × 42.6 cm.

Striking ‘Nagasaki-e‘ depicting Dutch merchants at table on Dejima, the small artificial island in Nagasaki harbour to which the Dutch were confined as Japan’s only permitted Western trading partners from 1641 until the mid-nineteenth century.

Five Dutchmen are shown dining at a formally laid table, seated on high-backed chairs—an arresting detail for a Japanese audience—several marked with the Dutch East India Company (VOC) monogram. The scene is rich in carefully observed and subtly exaggerated ‘Western’ traits: the use of cutlery, glassware, and the conspicuous presence of spittoons on the floor.

They are attended by two enslaved servants from the Indonesian archipelago, rendered as integral to the Dutch household. One pours gin, while the other presents a dish, reinforcing the theatricality and perceived luxury of the setting.

Produced for the local market, Nagasaki-e catered to a sustained fascination with the so-called ‘red-haired barbarians’ (kōmōjin), whose appearance and customs were at once exotic and only partially understood. The inscription above asserts the image’s veracity—“truthfully rendered”—a telling claim in light of the mixture of direct observation and artistic convention that defines the genre.

A vivid and highly characteristic example of Japanese visual responses to early modern European presence.

Price: Euro 2.350,-