Sumo Wrestlers of the Eastern Group: (right) Nijigadake Somaemon of Sekiwake Rank from Awa Province, and (left) Fudenoumi Kin'emon of Maegashira Rank from Kokura

Katsukawa Shunsho's sumo-e of Nijigadake Somaemon of sekiwake rank from Awa Province and Fudenoumi Kin'emon of maegashira rank from Kokura, dating to around 1777, is a representative example of the Katsukawa school's pioneering work in sumo prints. By the late 1770s professional sumo had become a major commercial entertainment in Edo, with formal ranking systems organizing wrestlers into Eastern and Western groups and rank tiers including yokozuna, ozeki, sekiwake, komusubi, and maegashira. The naming and ranking apparatus on this print, which identifies each wrestler by name, rank, and province of origin, mirrors the banzuke posters that announced upcoming tournaments. Shunsho was among the first ukiyo-e artists to develop sumo-e as a serious genre, and the Art Institute of Chicago sheet shows his approach: the two wrestlers are presented as named individuals, their bodies described with attention to specific physical characteristics rather than generic athletic idealization. Just as Katsukawa school yakusha-e refused interchangeable actor types in favor of identifiable likeness, the school's sumo-e refused interchangeable wrestlers in favor of recognizable figures. The print circulated as a souvenir or fan keepsake among Edo's sumo aficionados, and as part of a developing visual culture that surrounded the sport in parallel to the print culture surrounding kabuki. Shunsho's Edo ukiyo-e sumo-e thus extended Katsukawa school portraiture into another arena of celebrity, helping to establish the visual conventions that would govern the genre for the next century.