Three Sumō Wrestlers: Onogawa, Seimiyama, and Yatsugamine

Dated circa the 1790s and held by the Metropolitan Museum of Art, this Katsukawa Shunkō print depicts three legendary sumō wrestlers — Onogawa, Seimiyama, and Yatsugamine. Sumō prints (sumō-e) were a recognized parallel genre to actor prints, treating sumō wrestlers as celebrities of the same plebeian-culture pantheon that included kabuki stars and famous courtesans. Onogawa Kisaburō was one of the most celebrated yokozuna of the late eighteenth century, considered with his great rival Tanikaze to be a foundational figure in the modern sumō ranking system. Shunkō, like his teacher Shunshō, produced periodic sumō prints alongside his actor work, and his portraits of wrestlers display the same attention to individual physiognomy and bearing that characterized his yakusha-e — the wrestlers' faces, body types, and ceremonial mawashi (loincloth) patterns are rendered with documentary precision. This print may have been issued to commemorate a specific tournament or a memorable bout between the three figures. The Metropolitan's catalog dating of circa 1790s places the work in or near Shunkō's last productive years before his stroke; some scholars have argued that the latest Shunkō-signed sumō prints may include posthumous re-issues from his blocks. The print preserves Edo's celebrity culture of strength and stage in a single composition.