Nakamura Kanzaburô XVII as Miuranosuke in the play Kamakura Sandaiki

This print shows Nakamura Kanzaburô XVII as Miuranosuke, the young samurai protagonist of Kamakura Sandaiki (Three Generations of the Kamakura Shogunate), an 1781 jidaimono drama whose narrative is set against the conflict surrounding the fall of Osaka Castle. Miuranosuke is most strongly associated with the Kinugawa Mura scene, in which he visits his betrothed Toki-hime at her mother's deathbed before riding to battle. Ota likely renders Kanzaburô XVII in the role's formal samurai dress — hakama, kataginu, and the daishō pair of swords — caught in a moment of restrained dramatic tension consistent with the play's emotional register. The portrait employs the controlled palette and precise linework characteristic of Ota's actor studies, with the carver translating his preparatory sketches into a keyblock designed to preserve the specific physiognomy of the performer rather than a generalised role-type. Kanzaburô XVII (1909-1988) was among the actors Ota returned to repeatedly, and this sheet sits within the artist's sustained Showa-era programme of documenting kabuki's living tradition as it was performed at the major Tokyo theaters.