140 · 141
Left-hand sheet: Segawa Kikunojō III, Ōtani Oniji III, and Bandō Mitsugorō II. Right-hand sheet: Ichikawa Komazō II, Ichikawa Omezō and Nakayama Tomisaburō. The composition of the two sheets is tied together by the maple trees at either end and the leafy branches that droop into both pictures. These form the only background for the figures of the three wandering entertainers on the left, but the upper class people on the right and their servant are seen against the curtain hung for a picnic.
In our preliminary discussion of the dating of the set, attention has been called to the fact that the kimono worn in this diptych by Kikunojō and by Tomisaburō are the same as those in which they are shown in prints 106 and 94, one of which had to do with a performance at the Miyako-za in the eleventh month of 1794, and the other of which portrayed a scene from the production at the Kiri-za which was put on at the same time. To this statement we would add that the maple tree of the drawing appears again in the print of Tomisaburō.
The indications of coloring in the left-hand sheet are red for the lips of all three actors, with a little blue on the chin of Oniji and elsewhere.
The original we exhibit of the left-hand sheet showing the three mountebanks, was rephotographed from the Barboutau Catalogue, number 218D, for Rumpf Drawing number IV, as well as by Kurth, Nakata, etc. It was described under number 31 of the Jacquin Catalogue and it passed from that sale to the Spaulding Collection. The right-hand sheet has been rephotographed by us from the Barboutau Catalogue, number 218F, as Rumpf rephotographed it for his Drawing number V, and as the usual others have done.
Unsigned: Size: 8½×12 inches each.
Left sheet: Museum of Fine Arts (Spaulding Collection).
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