The Actors Ichikawa Yaozō III as Fuwa no Banzaemon Shigekatsu and Sakata Hangorō III as Kosodate Kannonbō
Returned to lender
This work of art was on loan to the museum and has since been returned to its lender.Sharaku’s lasting fame is due to the success of twenty-eight “large-head portraits” (ōkubi-e) with mica backgrounds, all created in early 1794, three of which are displayed nearby. Yet the artist followed up that effort with thirty-eight full-length portraits inspired by Kabuki performances of the seventh and eighth months of the same year. Some are large-format ōban, as here; others are in narrower formats. For reasons still unclear, by early the next year he would cease making prints altogether. Here, we see Ichikawa Yaozō (1747–1818) play the popular stock character Fuwa no Banzaemon—with an unshaven pate indicating he has fallen on bad times—as he receives a sword from the monk Kosodate Kannonbō, who had helped steal it from a rival.
Artwork Details
- 東洲斎写楽画 三代目市川八百蔵の不破の伴左衛門と 三代目坂田半五郎の子育て観音坊
- Title: The Actors Ichikawa Yaozō III as Fuwa no Banzaemon Shigekatsu and Sakata Hangorō III as Kosodate Kannonbō
- Artist: Tōshūsai Sharaku (Japanese, active 1794–95)
- Period: Edo period (1615–1868)
- Date: 1794, 7th month
- Culture: Japan
- Medium: Woodblock print (nishiki-e); ink, color and mica on paper; vertical ōban
- Dimensions: Image: 14 3/4. × 10 in. (37.5 × 25.4 cm)
- Classification: Prints
- Credit Line: Lent by Lee E. Dirks
- Curatorial Department: Asian Art