Detail View: The AMICA Library: The actor Ichikawa Danzo III as Shoki the Demon Queller in the play Dare Moyo Kumo ni Inazuma (Dandyish Design: Lightning Amid Clouds)
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AMICA ID:
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AIC_.1939.698
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AMICA Library Year:
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1998
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Object Type:
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Prints
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Creator Name:
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Katsukawa, Shunsho
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Creator Nationality:
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Asian; Far East Asian; Japanese
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Creator Dates/Places:
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Japanese; 1726-1792 Asia,East Asia,Japan
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Creator Name-CRT:
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Katsukawa Shunsho
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Title:
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The actor Ichikawa Danzo III as Shoki the Demon Queller in the play Dare Moyo Kumo ni Inazuma (Dandyish Design: Lightning Amid Clouds)
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Title Type:
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preferred
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View:
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full view
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Creation Date:
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Performed at the Morita Theater from the fifteenth day of the tenth month, 1768
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Creation Start Date:
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1768
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Creation End Date:
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1768
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Materials and Techniques:
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Woodblock print.
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Classification Term:
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Woodblock
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Creation Place:
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Asia,East Asia,Japan
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Dimensions:
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Hosoban; 33.2 x 15.2 cm
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AMICA Contributor:
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The Art Institute of Chicago
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Owner Location:
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Chicago, Illinois, USA
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ID Number:
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1939.698
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Credit Line:
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The Art Institute of Chicago, Frederick W. Gookin Collection
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Inscriptions:
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SIGNATURE: Shunsho gaARTIST'S SEAL: Hayashi in jar-shaped outline
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Rights:
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Context:
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The production at the Morita Theater in the tenth month of 1768 seems to have been based on a famous love triangle: the rivalry between the handsome playboys Nagoya Sanza and Fuwa Banzaemon for the affections of the courtesan Katsuragi. Shunsho made at least one more hosoban print of this production, this one showing Danzo III in Banzaemon's characteristic costume decorated with the striking cloud-and-lightning pattern (see 'The Actor's Image' catalogue, No. 78, p.226) that gave the play its name.The libretto for the day's proceedings does not survive, but the hodgepodge of roles recorded indicates that a plethora of extra material was piled onto the basic Nagoya Sanza/Fuwa Banzaemon story. Danzo III is recorded as having also played the sumo wrestler Inazuma (literally, 'Lightning,' a further reference to Banzaemon's costume), as well as ferocious Shoki the Demon Queller, shown here. Sakata Hangoro II played, among other roles, the Ghost of Daruma (Bodhidharma), possibly opposite Danzo III's Shoki!Shoki(C: Zhong Kui), a character from Chinese mythology, has acquired a host of legends, but in all of them he figures as a repeller of sickness and evil and a formidable chastiser of demons, and he is always depicted with bulging eyes and a profusion of hairand beard, wearing the black robe, cap, and boots of an official, and brandishing a sword. In Edo-period Japan Shoki became a popular folk deity who, as in China, cured sickness and warded off evil, and who often appears in paintings and prints wielding his sword against small horned demons. He is generally depicted in a pseudo-Chinese ink-painting style, evident even in this 'Kabuki' version, particularly in the exciting calligraphic ink lines that Shunsho used to describe the flying drapery.Perhaps because this forceful character is here incarnated in the vehement aragoto style of Kabuki acting, in this print Shoki seems even more than usually dynamic. His boots are planted so solidly upon the ground that he appears immovable, but his arms and sleeves and the ribbons on his cap all seem to be flying off in different directions.When the background was its original unfaded blue, the flesh-colored body makeup and the few small areas printed in white must have contrasted even more sharply with the somber blacks, grays, and blues of the costume.
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Related Image Identifier Link:
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AIC_.E19640.TIF
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