(b ?Kamigata [Kyoto–Osaka region], 1726; d Edo [now Tokyo], 1792). Print designer and painter. He was the leading artist of the Katsukawa school. Shunsho came to Edo to study haiku (17-syllable poems) with Shima Kensai and ukiyoe (‘pictures of the floating world’) painting (see JAPAN, §VI, 4(iv)(b)) with Miyagawa Shunsui ( fl 1741–70), a pupil of MIYAGAWA CHOSHUN. Shunsui changed his artist’s name (go) to Katsukawa when Choshun was disgraced. Unlike other students of the Miyagawa school, who were predominantly painters, Shunsho was best known for his woodblock prints of actors. Shunsho produced his first prints around 1760, when he was living in the house of the publisher Hayashiya Shichiemon. His early works included portraits of the actors Ichikawa Danzo IV, Nakamura Chuzo I and Nakamura Sukegoro. A seal in the shape of a jar (tsubo), containing the surname Hayashi, appears on the prints Shunsho designed during this period, leading some to conjecture that Shunsho and Hayashiya Shichiemon were the same person.

Part of the Katsukawa family

• Katsukawa Shunsho (1726-92)
  • collaboration
    • Ippitsusai Buncho
    • Kitao Shigemasa
  • groups and movements
    • Katsukawa
  • pupils
    • Katsukawa: (2) Katsukawa Shunko
    • Katsukawa: (3) Katsukawa Shun’ei
    • Katsukawa: (4) Katsukawa Shuncho
    • Katsushika Hokusai, §1: Early and middle years, 1778–c 1810
    • Shibata Zeshin
  • works
    • Japan, §VI, 4(iv)(b): Painting: Late: Genre painting: Ukiyoe
    • Japan, §IX, 3(ii)(a): Prints, Edo period & after: Production, subject-matter & social context
    • Japan, §IX, 3(iii)(b): Prints, c 1760–c 1780