Kunisada - Kabuki Actors in the play Ise Ondo (1850)
Kunisada - Kabuki Actors in the play Ise Ondo (1850)
Apologies for the slightly skewed picture. I actually own this artwork. A close family friend has been collecting 19th Century Japanese woodcuts his entire life, and he gifted this one of a wedding scene to my wife and I when we got married.
More details about the work. The artist Kunisada lived from 1786 to 1864 and he shared a studio / teacher with the (perhaps more famous) artist Kuniyoshi. This work was published by Hayashiya Shogoro in 1850.
The work depicts a Kabuki theatre scene; traditional Japanese theatre. Actors are playing the roles of Aburu-ya Oshin and Fukuoka Mitsugi in the play Ise Ondo. In this scene the couple are getting married.
Fun modern link: Tsukioka Yoshitoshi was apprenticed to Kuniyoshi (who shared a studio with Kunisada). He was a great woodblock printmaker in his own right, but many art historians note that he was one of the first artists to popularise comic book prints known as "chuban" which were one of the precursors to modern day manga.