Dutch Merchant
Dateearly 18th century
Label TextPaintings, ceramics, and netsuke carvings depicting Nanban (literally, “barbarians from the South”) circulated throughout Japan and reflect changing attitudes toward foreign influences. With stereotypical red, curly hair, this Dutchman wears a short, black embroidered coat and puffs on a long tobacco pipe that produces clouds of smoke.
In 1639, the Tokugawa Shogunate forbade the Portuguese from entering Japan and selected the Dutch and Chinese as trade partners instead. At Nagasaki harbor in Kyushu, the authorities built the tiny, fan-shaped island of Dejima and moved Dutch merchants there in 1641. The island connected to the shore by a single bridge to confine foreign access. Through Nagasaki and via China, Japan and the West exchanged goods and information about each other until the middle of the 19th century.
Object number34.118
Photo CreditPhoto: Spike Mafford
Exhibition HistoryPortland, Oregon, Portland Art Museum, Gift to a City: Masterworks from the Eugene Fuller Memorial Collection in the Seattle Art Museum, Nov. 3 - 28, 1965. Cat. no. 143.
Seattle, Washington, Seattle Art Museum, Refined Harmony: Decorative Arts from the Edo Period, Mar. 7, 2003 - Mar. 23, 2004.
Seattle, Washington, Seattle Art Museum, Japan Envisions the West: 16th - 19th Century Japanese Art from the Kobe City Museum, Oct. 7, 2007 - Jan. 8, 2008.
Seattle, Washington, Seattle Asian Art Museum, Legends, Tales, Poetry: Visual Narrative in Japanese Art, Dec. 22, 2012 - July 21, 2013.Published ReferencesFuller, Richard E. Japanese Art in the Seattle Art Museum: An Historical Sketch, Seattle, WA: Seattle Art Museum, 1960 ("Presented in commemoration of the Hundredth Anniversary of Diplomatic Relations between Japan and the United States of America"), no. 170.Credit LineEugene Fuller Memorial Collection
DimensionsOverall (incl. mounting with endknobs): 57 7/8 × 27 3/16 in. (147 × 69 cm)
Image: 26 7/16 × 19 1/8 in. (67.2 × 48.5 cm)
MediumWatercolor with ceramic knobs
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