Chikyu Greetings - Japanese Card - Samurai

Chikyu Greetings - Japanese Card - Samurai

A Japanese folded greeting card, published by Chikyu Greetings, reproducing a classic ukiyo-e print: the warrior Soga Gorō in his most celebrated kabuki role, his face painted red and white and his gaze fixed on the viewer.

The image comes from the series One Hundred Roles of Ichikawa Danjūrō (市川団十郎演芸百番) by the printmaker Toyohara Kunichika, and corresponds to the second sheet, Yanone Gorō. Kunichika was the great portraitist of actors of the Meiji era, and this series set down one by one the roles of the Ichikawa Danjūrō line, the most influential theatrical dynasty in Japan.

The play depicted is Yanone (矢の根, "The Arrowhead"), one of the Eighteen Great Plays that only the Danjūrō family has the right to perform. Its protagonist, Soga Gorō Tokimune, sharpens an enormous arrowhead with which he intends to avenge his father's death; he falls asleep, dreams that his brother is in danger, and bolts off to the rescue. It is a New Year repertory piece, which is why the composition is scattered with lucky objects belonging to the Japanese New Year.

The acting style is aragoto (荒事), the heroic, outsized register created by the first Ichikawa Danjūrō: emphatic gestures, oversized costume and, above all, kumadori, the makeup of red strokes on a white ground that underlines the muscles and veins of the face to express the hero's righteous fury. It is the image the whole world associates with kabuki.

The card is folded, opening like a book, and comes with an inner sheet printed with a message and a standard white envelope cut to size. The format is designed precisely for sending greetings abroad: the manufacturer itself recommends it for writing to people outside Japan.

Ideal as a greeting card, to accompany a gift, or to frame and keep as a small decorative print once it has been read.

About Chikyu Greetings. Chikyu Greetings, based in Asakusabashi (Tokyo), is a Japanese stationery publisher whose "Chikyu" brand goes back to the Meiji era, around 130 years ago. It specialises in greeting cards and paper goods — envelopes, letter paper, pochibukuro, stickers and Japanese-style bookmarks — with a style the company itself describes as basic, warm designs with a touch of whimsy.