Jiraiya, Tsubo-sumire (Jiraiya, Violet) / Tosei mitate sanju-rokkasen 當盛見立 三十六花撰 (Contemporary Kabuki Actors Likened to Thirty-Six Flowers (Immortals of Poetry))

Jiraiya, Tsubo-sumire (Jiraiya, Violet) is a sheet from Utagawa Kunisada's Tosei mitate sanju-rokkasen (Contemporary Kabuki Actors Likened to Thirty-Six Flowers / Immortals of Poetry), pairing a star Edo kabuki actor in the role of the magical bandit Jiraiya with a classical poetic immortal and an emblematic flower - in this case the violet (tsubo-sumire), a humble springtime bloom whose modesty plays gently against the hero's outlaw bravado. Jiraiya, the toad-riding hero of the long-running Jiraiya goketsu monogatari narratives, was one of the most beloved kabuki magical-warrior roles of the nineteenth century, and Kunisada designed many prints of his various stage incarnations. Here he presents the figure in a strong half-length composition, with the focused glare and patterned costume that announce a supernatural role, while the cartouches at top integrate the design into the wider series. As the dominant designer of yakusha-e in nineteenth-century Edo, Kunisada used the mitate sanju-rokkasen framework to flatter literate connoisseurs while keeping his publishers' commercial output firmly grounded in the world of kabuki celebrity. The impression at the British Museum, indexed on ukiyo-e.org, is a clean reference for the print. Source: ukiyo-e.org / British Museum (https://ukiyo-e.org/image/bm/AN00431676_001_l).