Utagawa Kunisada (歌川国貞) / Toyokuni III (三代豊国) (artist 1786 – 01/12/1865)
Nakamura Shikan II as Narikoyama in the series 'Actors with Six Jewel Faces' (Haiyū mutama-gao - 俳優六玉顔)
1832
10.25 in x 15 in (Overall dimensions) Japanese color woodblock print
Signed: Kōchōrō Kunisada ga
香蝶楼国貞画
Publisher: Yamagucihya Tōbei
(Marks 591 - seal 15-005)
Censor's seal: kiwame
Waseda University Theater Museum
Lyon Collection - Yamatoya Baiga from this series
Lyon Collection - Bandō Hikosaburō IV from this series
Lyon Collection - Bandō Mitsugorō IV from this series
Nationaal Museum van Wereldculturen (Rijksmuseum Volkenkunde, Leiden) via Ritsumeikan University The Six Jewel Rivers were noted beauty spots of antiquity. The title of this series is a pun on the words kawa (river) and kao (face). In this magnificent set, for the landscape background Kunisada took advantage of the fashionable vogue for prints in the new imported Prussian blue pigment (aizuri-e). This particular river may be the Tōi no Tamagawa (梼衣玉川) or 'Cloth-fulling River' in Settsu Province.
Illustrations of the set in Izzard, Kunisada's World page 142 cat #s 66/1 and 66/2).
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Also illustrated in color in Ukiyo-e Masterpieces in European Collection 5: Victoria and Albert Museum II, Kodansha, 1989, #11.
Yamaguchiya Tōbei (山口屋藤兵衛) (publisher)
actor prints (yakusha-e - 役者絵) (genre)
blue prints (aizuri-e - 藍摺絵) (genre)
Nakamura Shikan II (二代目中村芝翫: 11/1825 - 12/1835) (actor)
landscape prints (fūkeiga 風景画) (genre)