Onoe Shôroku II in the role of Kudô Suketsune in the play Soga no Taimen,

Soga no Taimen ("The Confrontation of the Soga Brothers") stages the formal audience at which the brothers Goro and Juro Soga first face their father's killer, Kudo Suketsune. As the seated Suketsune presiding over the New Year's gathering, Shoroku II projects the role's required combination of authority and concealed wariness. Kokei renders the actor in bust-length okubi-e format, focusing on the heavy-lidded eyes and pursed mouth that define the part. The print likely employs gofun for the white face paint and pulverized mica (kira) to lend metallic shimmer to the formal hitatare or kamishimo. Kokei's [sosaku-hanga](/glossary/sosaku-hanga) method — designing, carving, and printing each impression himself in editions of around seventy on ganpi — distinguishes him from earlier [yakusha-e](/glossary/yakusha-e) workshops that divided labor among publisher, designer, carver, and printer. The portrait belongs to the artist's documentary record of leading kabuki actors of his generation.