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Actor Arashi Rikan as Chinzei Hachirō Tametomo by Ryūsai Shigeharu — Japanese Woodblock print (nishiki-e); ink and color on paper; vertical ōban, 1833

Actor Arashi Rikan as Chinzei Hachirō Tametomo

by Ryūsai Shigeharu

Date:
1833
Medium:
Woodblock print (nishiki-e); ink and color on paper; vertical ōban

Description

This 1833 yakusha-e by Ryūsai Shigeharu, held by the Museum of Fine Arts Boston (accession 455806), depicts the actor Arashi Rikan II as the medieval warrior Chinzei Hachirō Tametomo. Minamoto no Tametomo (1139-1170) was the celebrated archer of the Genpei wars whose superhuman strength and exile to the Izu islands became the basis for Bakin's late novel Chinsetsu yumiharizuki (Strange Tales of the Crescent Moon, 1807-1811), and the kabuki adaptations of the early 1830s drew on the novel's most dramatic episodes to provide warrior-spectacle vehicles for the leading Osaka tachiyaku. Rikan II's interpretation of the Tametomo role in 1833 placed him in the lineage of Osaka stars who had taken the part. The print is preserved as a color woodblock print on paper in the vertical ōban format at the Museum of Fine Arts Boston, accessioned as part of the Bigelow-era kamigata-e holdings that constitute the museum's substantial Shigeharu collection. The image's late-1833 dating places it in the period of Shigeharu's continued single-sheet productivity following his 1829-1831 peak, and the choice of Tametomo as subject connects the print to the broader vogue for Bakin-derived warrior-narratives that drove kabuki repertoire choices through the early Tenpō period.

More Prints by Ryūsai Shigeharu

Frequently Asked Questions

Actor Arashi Rikan as Chinzei Hachirō Tametomo was created by Ryūsai Shigeharu (柳斎重春) in 1833.