Shiba Kokan Tweelandbruk handcoloured copperplate etch 1787
Shiba Kokan was educated as a traditional Japanese painter but was a rational thinker and determinedly opposed to the ancient Chinese myths suggesting that art was able to create lifeforces (see left sidebar) According to Shiba Kokan " a representation (painting) carries the name of what it represents, but not her energy". Besides artist Shiba Kokan was a writer, scientist and inventor. Sometimes he is compared with Leonardo da Vinci. To a certain extent he was in his own way the personification of the Japanese Renaissance in the early Meiji period. He faultlessly smelled the new era and restlessly preached the new way of thinking.
In 1788 he departed from Tokyo for a 3 year trip by foot to Nagasaki to improve his Western paintings skills at Deshima with the Dutch. The head of the Dutch VOC mission, Isaac Titsing, gave him a Dutch paintingbook (" Const Schilderboek").
Besides studying Western oilpainting techniques, he studied the technique of copperplate etching, astronomy, geography and (applied) natural sciences. He was very interested in the practical applications of natural science, like making maps, the camera obscura, and magnifying-glasses etc.
On his way back to Tokyo he gave many lectures on" Dutch knowledge" and demonstrations with Western instruments. In his later years he wrote a book on the Western art of painting ("Dissertatie over schilderkunst")