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Lot Essay
This is one of a large series of portraits of popular kabuki actors. At least fifteen of them, thought to be published in Kansei 8 (1796), have a seal reading Uemura, either the name of a publisher or possibly of a patron adding his own mark to a privately-commissioned set. Many were luxuriously printed with gray background, hand-painted details, as seen here on the hair ornaments, and metallic embellishments.
For another impression in the Fogg Art Museum, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts see Narazaki Muneshige, et al., Foggu bijutsukan.../Fogg Art Museum, Harvard University..., vol. 8 of Ukiyo-e shuka (Tokyo: Shogakukan, 1980), pl. 40. Other impressions are in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston and Tokyo National Museum. Another impression was sold Sotheby's, London, Highly Important Japanese Prints, Illustrated Books and Drawings from the Henri Vever Collection: Part I, 26 March, 1974, lot 285.
For another impression in the Fogg Art Museum, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts see Narazaki Muneshige, et al., Foggu bijutsukan.../Fogg Art Museum, Harvard University..., vol. 8 of Ukiyo-e shuka (Tokyo: Shogakukan, 1980), pl. 40. Other impressions are in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston and Tokyo National Museum. Another impression was sold Sotheby's, London, Highly Important Japanese Prints, Illustrated Books and Drawings from the Henri Vever Collection: Part I, 26 March, 1974, lot 285.