![Bandō Shūka 坂東しうか or 坂東志うか (poetry name of Mitsugorō III - 秀佳) - as Kōguya Yahei [香具や弥兵衛] - probably from the play Chūkō Ōiso ga Yoi (?) (忠孝染分纏)](https://woodblockprints.org/media/lyon_collection/images/1/8/88098_ca_object_representations_media_1828_large.jpg)
![Ichikawa Omezō I [市川男女蔵] as Musashibō Benkei [弁慶] and Ichikawa Yaozō III [市川八百蔵] as Shinchūnagon Tomomori [新中納言知盛] in <i>Yoshitsune Senbon Zakura</i> [義経千本桜]](https://woodblockprints.org/media/lyon_collection/images/8/54337_ca_object_representations_media_826_large.jpg)
Welcome to The Lyon Collection!
Ukiyo-e Prints in the Mike Lyon Collection
Mike Lyon (artist b. 1951) was fortunate to have grown up familiar with Japanese prints. In his youth Lyon’s parents and grandparents displayed examples that certainly inspired his own artistic development. He began acquiring Japanese color woodcuts early in his career as an artist. The types of prints that feature most prominently among the many hundreds in Lyon's collection reflect the artist’s deep appreciation of the human figure and the expressive facial portrait. The vast majority of Japanese prints in the Lyon collection represent views of actors yakusha-e) and beautiful women (bijin-ga), and in particular the close-up, bust-length portraits of the same (okubi-e).