Comments - Terrific scene from the kabuki play "Kaidan Botan Doro" (The Peony Lantern), a ghost story which premiered at the Kabukiza in July 1892. In the center, Onoe Kikugoro V stars as Tomozo, a faithless servant of Shinsaburo, whose secret lover Otsuyu commits suicide along with her maid after the couple's affair is discovered. The ghosts of the beauty and her maid visit Shinsaburo nightly, but cannot enter his home because of a charm of the Goddess Kannon that a priest had placed above his doorway to prevent them from coming in. Tomozo removes the charm, and the ghosts come and take his master to the land of the dead. Here, Tomozo raises his sword and struggles to free himself as two guards stop him when he attempts to flee across a grassy plain. One grabs him by the wrist as the other thrusts an iron truncheon under his neck. At left, two samurai make their way through the tall grasses curving in the night breeze, misty clouds drifting across the full moon at upper left. The border simulates an eerie, tattered and wormhole-ridden edge, a convention we've only seen used before in Yoshitoshi's "Thirty-six Ghosts." A great design with large expressive figures and a beautifully drawn and shaded atmospheric setting.

Artist - Kunisada III (1848 - 1920)

Image Size - 14 1/8" x 28" + margins as shown

Condition - This print with excellent color and detail as shown. Three separate panels, backed with paper. Slight toning and soiling, a few creases. Please see photos for details. Good overall.