Kusunoki Tamonmaru Masatsura Engaged in Combat from the series Actors on a Stage

This print is part of a triptych, a set of correlated images on three panels that are connected to each side, and draws inspiration from Katsushika Hokusai’s former interest as a manga artist. Prior to publishing manga, Hokusai apprenticed as a bookseller and became a pupil of painter and printmaker Katsukawa Shunshō at the age of 18. In Shunsho’s school, he experimented with actor prints and book illustration.