Arashi Ryūzō I as Ishibe Kinkichi in the Play "Hana Ayame Bunroku Soga"

This 1794 Toshusai Sharaku okubi-e, in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, depicts the actor Arashi Ryuzo I in the role of Ishibe Kinkichi in the kabuki play Hana Ayame Bunroku Soga, one of the seasonal Soga-themed dramas that filled the Edo stage in the Kansei era. The sheet belongs to the [yakusha-e](/glossary/yakusha-e) series Sharaku designed for the publisher Tsutaya Juzaburo and is among the more arresting villain portraits in his short Edo [ukiyo-e](/glossary/ukiyo-e) career.

Ishibe Kinkichi is a money-lender-villain role, and Sharaku has matched the character's predatory function with a sharply unsentimental portrait. Ryuzo I's face is drawn with a long, slightly hooked nose, a thin downturned mouth, and the eyes narrowed into a calculating sideways glance. The brows are set low, the wrinkles around the mouth and along the nose preserved without softening, and the lower lip drawn out in a small, almost grasping line. The portrait reads as a behavioral study, recording how a particular kind of moral attitude shapes a particular face.