Ichikawa Danjuro (X?) in a shibaraku role

This yakusha-e portrays the kabuki actor Ichikawa Danjuro in the role of Kamakura Gongoro Kagemasa from Shibaraku, one of the kabuki juhachiban plays held as the hereditary repertoire of the Ichikawa Danjuro line. The Shibaraku role is identifiable by its oversized persimmon-red suo robe bearing the Mimasu three-nested-squares crest of the Ichikawa house, the bold red and black sujiguma kumadori makeup signifying righteous strength, and the long sword carried as the hero arrives onstage to halt an injustice. Sadanobu III renders the figure in the frontal, declamatory mie pose central to the role, with carved lines describing the stiff folds of the costume and flat color blocks heightened by the red of the suo against a plain ground. Although best known for Osaka and Kansai landscapes, Sadanobu III periodically returned to actor portraiture, the genre on which the first Hasegawa Sadanobu had built the family reputation in late-Edo Osaka. The print continues that Kamigata yakusha-e lineage into the twentieth century.