Okuni kabuki byobu-zu - Public domain portrait painting

Okuni Kabuki-zu Byōbu, the oldest known portrait of Izumo no Okuni. Six-fold screen, color on gold-leafed paper. A collection of Kyoto National Museum. This is a Important Cultural Property of Japan.
This screen may have been painted around 1603 (Keichô 8), when Okuni of Izumo (now Shimane Prefecture) led a dance troupe of women to perform kabuki odori (“eccentric dances”) on the Noh stage at Kitano Shrine in Kyoto. The painting depicts the performance of the popular Okuni kabuki play, Chaya asobi (“Amusement at the Teahouse”), with the central character holding a sword, a comical performer with a towel around her head, and the teashop owner sitting by the right pillar. The instrumental accompaniment includes flute and drums but not shamisen, indicating an early period of kabuki. The composition and rendering of pine trees are similar to the screen paintings at Myôren-ji Temple, strongly suggesting that this work belongs to the genre paintings of the Hasegawa school.
日本語: 京都国立博物館収蔵『阿國歌舞伎圖屏風』六曲一隻、紙本金地著色（出雲阿国を描いた最古の屏風絵）。舞台上を見ると、刀を肩にかけたかぶき者、柱のそばに坐す茶屋のかか、頬かむりをした道化役の猿若がおり、これは阿国歌舞伎の代表的演目である「茶屋遊び」が演じられていることを示す。出雲の阿国が北野社の能舞台を代用して「歌舞伎踊り」を始めたのは慶長8年(1603)、本図はその舞台を描いたもので、制作もそれからさほど降らぬ頃と考えられる。囃座も三味線などなく、笛、小鼓、大鼓、太鼓ばかりで、いかにも初期的様相を示す。図中に印象的に配された松の表現が、たとえば妙蓮寺障壁画中のそれと通有する性格を有しており、長谷川派による風俗画の一例とする有力な説がある。