Kunisada 国貞: The actor Ichikawa Ichizo III with Rainbow 寺にし閑心　三代目市川市蔵

Artist: Utagawa Kunisada 歌川国貞 (1786-1865)

Title: The actor Ichikawa Ichizo III as the Stylish Villain Teranishi Kanshin 寺にし閑心　三代目市川市蔵

Series: Legends of Chivalrous Kabuki Heroes 梨園侠客伝 (Rien kyokaku den) Date: 1863

The actor Ichikawa Ichizō III as Teranishi Kanshin. He stands with an open folding fan decorated with a Chinese-style landscape. Above his head is a vibrant, rainbow-like arch of bright colors. (Note that the MFA Boston impression from a later edition lacks the rainbow completely, as well as the third color in the background sky.) The character Teranishi Kanshin appeared in Banzui Chôbei shôjin manaita 幡随長兵衛精進俎板 and Ukiyo zuka Hiyoku no Inazuma　浮世柄比翼稲妻. Kanshin plays a villain in both of these stories. The two plays center on the real-life figure of Banzuiin Chobei, a real-life otokodate (heroic street knight) whose life and death inspired these very popular plays. Kunisada’s depiction here is probably from Ukiyozuka Hiyoku no Inazuma, where Kanshin is the assumed alias of the primary villain, Fuwa Banzaemon. The author of this play ingeniously merged the villains of both stories into a single figure. Kunisada in this series is known to have created fantasy roles for real actors, rather than strictly portraying them in specific plays of the day. Rien Kyokaku den is considered a character-study series of famous otokodate and their rivals. This scene might be where Kanshin is in the disguise of the samurai Fuwa Banzaemon and is visiting the Yoshiwara pleasure district as a wealthy, haughty patron vying for the attention of the courtesan Katsuragi. This would occur right before a famous (sayaate) confrontation with his nemesis. It may also be the scene where Kanshin arrives at Banzui Chobei’s residence prior to the famous “chopping board” confrontation. The actor would seem to be holding a pose (mie) in the theater on the hanamichi runway, and the dramatic effect in the sky is a way to heighten the actor’s presence even further. The way the actor is shown lifting up his robe hem may also indicate a hanamichi entrance. In this same series, the artist portrayed a number of other characters from this same kabuki “world”, including the hero Banzui Chobei, Shirai Gonpachi and Mizuno Jurozaemon. Edo viewers of the time would know these invented worlds by heart, so it would have given both artist and audience great pleasure to interact with them in a fresh way.

This series features absolutely breathtaking printing quality, and our examples come from a near-complete set of the luxurious first edition. With mica in the sky, lacquer-imitating shine on the black and on the brown part of the fan, stunning bokashi in the sky, and an unusual freshness that belies the age of the work.

Condition: Excellent impression, color and condition. Extremely fresh; untrimmed and unbacked, on deluxe paper. Minor fold where the left margin meets the colored edge of the block.

Dimensions: ôban (37.4 x 25.6 cm) Publisher: Hiranoya Shinzô 
Signature: Nanajūhassai Toyokuni hitsu 七十八歳豊国筆

References: See MFA Boston, accession number 11.42896

SKU: KUS642