About This Print

Picturing the actor Ichikawa Danshirō III, o

ne of twenty-four prints in the last series, titled 

New Portraits of Actors on the Stage, 

Shunsen designed for the publisher Watanabe.

The Series Forms of Actors Onstage (New Portraits of Actors on the Stage)

Source: Dramatic Impressions: Japanese Theatre Prints from the Gilbert Luber Collection, Chance, Frank L. & Davis, Julie Nelson, University of Pennsylvania Press, 2007, p.38 and as footnoted.    

The last phase of Shunsen’s career as a printmaker lasted for just three years – from 1951 to 1954 – and resulted in another series: Butai no sugata-e (Forms of Actors On Stage).¹ This series did not meet with the critical acclaim of Shunsen's earlier prints and Kendall Brown writes "The intense emotions and melodramatic poses found in many of these prints reveal the self-parody of Shunsen's late work, the stagnation of postwar kabuki, or perhaps both.²

The Actor in the Print: Ichikawa Danshirō III
Source: Kabuki 21 website http://www.kabuki21.com/danshiro3.php
Real name: Kinoshi Masanori
The actor Ichikawa Danshirō III (October 5, 1908 – November 18, 1963) held this name from July 1930 to November 1963. Ichikawa Danshirō III was a tachiyaku actor, who did not reach the levels of fame of his father Ichikawa En'ō or his elder son Ichikawa Ennosuke III but was a steady mainstay of the Omodakaya guild. His best roles were Tarōgo ("Kurozuka"), Hayami no Tōta ("Yoshinoyama") and Iwanaga Saemon ("Akoya").

Catalogue Raisonné – Ukiyoe Kabuki Gi Han Ga: Shunsen Natori (The Skill of Natori Shunsen in Kabuki Prints), Kushigata Municipal Shunsen Museum Kushigata, Japan; 1991, p.63, pl. 68.