Memorial Portrait of the Actor Arashi Kichisaburō III

Memorial Portrait of the Actor Arashi Kichisaburō III (1864) is one of the most often-reproduced shini-e (memorial actor prints) of the late Edo period and stands at the beginning of Toyohara Kunichika's mature career. The shini-e was a specialized sub-genre of [yakusha-e](/glossary/yakusha-e) in which a kabuki actor was commemorated immediately after his death, generally in the Buddhist white robes of a memorial portrait, often paired with a death poem (jisei) and the dates of his life. Arashi Kichisaburō III (1810-1864) was a Kamigata actor with a substantial Edo following, especially in jitsugoto (mature male) roles, and his death in the third month of 1864 generated several memorial prints, of which Kunichika's is the most artistically ambitious. The figure is set against a quiet ground with the actor's crest at the upper register and an inscription identifying his stage name; Kunichika's drawing of the face is informed both by Kunisada's mid-century ōkubi-e portrait tradition and by his own close knowledge of the Edo theater world. The Art Institute of Chicago copy (Judson D. Metzger Collection) is a representative ōban impression and one of the museum's significant Bakumatsu-period shini-e.