The Actor Iwai Hanshiro IV as Okumi of the Mieido Fan Shop (?) in the Play Sanjuk-koku Yobune no Hajimari (?), Performed at the Ichimura Theater (?) in the Fifth Month, 1789 (?) c. 1789

Katsukawa Shun'ei created this woodblock print depicting the actor Iwai Hanshiro IV in 1789. This image, like many ukiyo-e prints produced in Japan during the Edo period, depicts a popular actor in a famous Kabuki play. But it goes beyond mere portraiture. In a society rigidly divided by class, the theater offered a space to play with social roles. Kabuki theater in particular was known for its subversive tendencies. The exaggerated costumes and makeup, the stylized movements, and the use of male actors to play female roles all contributed to the creation of an alternate reality on stage. Woodblock prints like this one helped to disseminate that theatrical world to a wider audience. Scholars of Japanese history and culture can use such images, along with play scripts and theater records, to reconstruct the world of Edo-period Kabuki and to understand its role in shaping social identities and challenging social norms.