The Actors Nakamura Shichisaburo III (right), and Ichikawa Junzo I (left), in the Play Nue no Mori Ichiyo no Mato, Performed at the Nakamura Theater in the Eleventh Month, 1770

This color woodblock print by Katsukawa Shunsho commemorates a performance at the Nakamura Theater in the eleventh month of 1770, depicting the kabuki actors Nakamura Shichisaburo III on the right and Ichikawa Junzo I on the left in the play Nue no Mori Ichiyo no Mato. The eleventh-month program traditionally inaugurated the new theatrical season in Edo, and Shunsho's design captures the actors in dramatic poses appropriate to a high-stakes opening production. Each figure is rendered with the kind of individualised features that defined the new style of yakusha-e introduced by the Katsukawa school: angled brows, particular jaw lines, and observed gestures replace the more generic faces of earlier actor printing. The pair appear against a plain ground, focusing attention on costume, stance, and the specific theatrical moment. Shunsho's collaboration with the Edo publishing trade made these prints into prized souvenirs for theatre-going collectors, who could keep on their walls a record of a season's most talked-about scenes. As one of the founders of the Katsukawa school and a major figure in Edo ukiyo-e, Shunsho was reshaping the genre throughout these years. The print is held in the collection of the Art Institute of Chicago, where it stands as a documentary record of the Edo kabuki stage in 1770 and of the Katsukawa school's emerging visual vocabulary.