Kabuki & Japanese print: Yakusha-e

The film The Kabuki Master

The release of the film The Kabuki Master in late 2025 brings to light an art form long central to Japanese popular culture: Kabuki theater.

But what exactly is Kabuki? This style of theater is intriguing: the costumes, the makeup, the gestures, the roles...

Before cinema and photography, Kabuki was also seen off stage. Actors were known, followed, recognized, and their image circulated in the form of prints. These are called yakusha-e.

To understand everything about Kabuki & Yakusha-e, click here!

Kabuki: essential landmarks

Kabuki is a form of theater that appeared in the Edo period in the early 17th century, in major Japanese cities like Kyoto, Osaka, and then Edo. It is an urban and popular theater, intended for a wide audience.

Very early on, it became structured around fixed roles. An actor specializes in a precise type of character, which he can interpret throughout his life. Acting styles and actors' names are often passed down within lineages. The famous Ichikawa Danjūrō lineage is over 300 years old, with Ichikawa Danjūrō XIII today!

Noteworthy categories include:

• heroic roles
• antagonists
• comic roles
• elderly roles
• and onnagata, female roles played by men

The acting relies on strict visual codes: makeup (kumadori), spectacular costumes, stylized gestures. Certain poses, called mie, freeze the actor at a key moment to concentrate all dramatic tension in the face and posture.

In some ways, Kabuki is reminiscent of the Italian Commedia dell’Arte: a popular theater based on fixed roles, immediately recognizable characters, and acting that primarily involves the body and costume.

When Kabuki becomes an image: yakusha-e

Yakusha-e are ukiyo-e prints depicting Kabuki actors in their roles (Yakusha = actor in Japanese). They show actors on stage, identifiable by their costume, makeup, and pose.

In the Edo period, Kabuki actors were true celebrities. The public followed their careers, recognized their emblematic roles, and compared their interpretations. The prints extended this experience: they circulated, were collected, and commented upon. A bit like Pokémon cards today! ^^

Yakusha-e thus became one of the major themes of Japanese printmaking.

👉 For those who want to understand all the themes of Japanese prints: check out our article on the major themes of Japanese prints

How to recognize a Kabuki actor print?

Several elements make it possible to quickly identify a yakusha-e print.

• Makeup: whitened face, red, blue, or black lines indicating the character's nature.
• Gaze: very expressive eyes, sometimes deliberately cross-eyed, especially in mie poses.
• Posture: frozen gestures, stopped at the peak of the action.
• Costume: rich, graphic, immediately recognizable.

And if you want to know how to recognize an authentic Japanese print, click here 👇

Print masters and Kabuki: a central genre

Yakusha-e spans the entire history of ukiyo-e. Almost all great artists have tackled it.

Kunisada (aka Toyokuni III) is the central figure. No other artist has depicted Kabuki actors as extensively and over such a long period. His work documents actors, roles, costumes, and the evolution of theater, constituting a true visual memory of Kabuki.

👉 Read also:
Kunisada, master of Japanese prints

👉 Works available in
Our collection of Japanese prints

Toyohara Kunichika directly follows this lineage. Active later, he is, after Kunisada, the artist most closely associated with yakusha-e. His prints, more colorful and elaborate, show a spectacular Kabuki at the end of its golden age.

Sharaku, conversely, remains a brief apparition. His vision is harsher, more psychological, showing actors in the effort of performance.

The fact that artists like Kuniyoshi or Hiroshige, known for other major genres, also produced yakusha-e confirms the central nature of this field.

👉 Read also:
Kuniyoshi, king of fantastic prints

 

Onnagata: when the image blurs the lines

The onnagata, actors specializing in female roles, are one of the most fascinating aspects of Kabuki. Originally, women performed in Kabuki, but in the 17th century, authorities banned their presence on stage, as theater was deemed too closely linked to seduction, prostitution, and public disorder (not very feminist, all that...). Female roles were then entrusted to adult men, giving rise to the onnagata.

In yakusha-e, it is sometimes difficult to distinguish an onnagata from a bijin-ga, a print depicting a beautiful woman. This ambiguity is intentional.

The onnagata does not imitate a real woman. He embodies a stylized, transmitted, and codified femininity, which the print further accentuates.

However, a few clues can help:

• very theatrical or frozen poses
• slightly more strained gestures
• facial expressions marked by stage performance
• and especially inscriptions mentioning the actor, role, or Kabuki play

Despite this, doubt often persists... Man? Woman? It is precisely this ambiguity that gives these images their power.

👉 Look for Onnagata in our KOGEDO Japanese print collection

Why yakusha-e remain relevant

Yakusha-e speak of public image, role, and performance. They show well-known figures, frozen in a posture intended to be recognized and remembered.

This relationship to image remains surprisingly close to ours, which explains the constant interest in these prints.

The KOGEDO perspective

At KOGEDO, when we look at a Yakusha-e print, we always imagine the artist watching the play and the actors performing in a sumptuous Kabuki theater from the Edo era! It's fascinating!