The Actor Sanjo Kantaro holding a pipe

Sanjo Kantaro, an Edo onnagata specialist of the early eighteenth century, is portrayed here holding a long-stemmed Japanese pipe (kiseru) in a hand-colored hosoban urushi-e of around 1720. The actor is shown in a moment of stillness rather than dramatic action, the pipe held casually at one side as if pausing between scenes. The urushi-e technique gives the costume a deeper, glossier black than the standard sumizuri-e impression would yield, and the orange tan applied selectively to other costume elements provides chromatic contrast. Onnagata roles required actors to embody a stylized vision of femininity that drew on both theatrical convention and contemporary fashion, and Kiyonobu's prints of these performers were highly collected.