Okada Beisanjin

Okada Beisanjin, also called Hikobē, (born 1744, Ōsaka, Japan—died Oct. 15, 1820, Ōsaka), Japanese painter who worked in the bunjin-ga, or literati, style that originated in China and appealed to intellectuals.

The son of a prosperous rice merchant, Okada enjoyed reading and was fond of the books of paintings that had been collected by his family for generations. He came under the influence of the painter-musician Uragami Gyokudō and other artists who were family friends. Later he became a retainer of a lord and was his official Confucian teacher. He excelled in painting landscapes in the bunjin-ga style that he mastered by studying illustrated books of Chinese paintings. Okada’s technique was rather crude, but he drew with an impressive economy of strokes. His works were original and serene, a good example being “Picture Album of Landscape.”