Portrait of Utagawa Kunisada by his student, Kunisada II

Utagawa Toyokuni III (豊国) (Utagawa Kunisada) was a student of Toyokuni I of the Utagawa school. Toyokuni III was the last of two successors who used the name 豊国 to sign his work. Toyokuni III's rise to fame came from his work on e-hon (books illustrated with ukiyo-e,) and he was said to be on the same level, or have surpassed, his teacher Toyokuni II. He eventually became so masterful at ukiyo-e that Toyokuni II eventually returned to signing his own name (Toyshige), rather than the name of his teacher. Kunisada referred to himself as Toyokuni II, although the real Toyokuni II (Toyoshige) was still alive and active at this point. Kunisada intentionally ignored his predecessor, despite Toyoshige having been named the head of the school after Toyokuni I's death. Because of this confusion, he is usually referred to as Toyokuni III.
Toyokuni III followed in his teacher's footsteps and created many actor prints during his active years. He began his early work creating images of bijin-ga, and some of his most famous ukiyo-e came from these early bijin-ga, such is this:

The Hours of the Yoshiwara

The piece I chose to focus on was one of his actor prints of Nakamura Utaemon, a kabuki actor who Kunisada depicted many times during his years. The image I chose was this image of Nakamura Utaemon playing a female character:

The image itself is of a female figure dressed up and standing under the cherry blossoms. She is standing near a set of baskets with a rod through them. Her one foot is visible under her Kimono, but her hands cannot be seen. The cherry blossoms over her head indicate it's most likely Spring, around later April/May. There is a hat on her head to protect from the sun, and she's wearing many layers of clothing. The hat contains two ties in order to keep the hat from falling off in the wind, and is tied under the chin. She is also using part of her un-belted kimono to cover her head under the hat, which was very common for this time period. The outer black kimono was common during this time period for mourning, and would be decorated with kamon (symbols) as is seen in the print. However, the other articles of clothing would also be black, and the undergarments white. The dress contrasted with the fact she is doing yard work is very confusing, since she is dressed better than someone from a working class would usually be dressed, especially to do yard work, but she is still outdoors with her baskets. The hat shows that she's concerned about keeping her skin pale, something common women would not generally be concerned about. She also is half wearing traditional mourning clothes, and half wearing spring clothes. Since, however, this is an artist print, it's much more likely that the clothing would contrast the actions. Nakamura Utaemon, a man, is dressed up as this woman, who is quite possibly a peasant woman. Since it's for a stage show, the actor may have worn more elaborate coverings than what would usually be worn in a typical situation. 

It's actually impossible to find this image anywhere online, or to find out which actor of the Nakamura line is depicted in this piece. The Japanese characters around the image may give some clues, however I am not able to read what the print says.It is interesting, however, that the piece is very similar to Kunisada's bijin-ga pieces, and without knowing the piece is a male kabuki actor, would be impossible to distinguish from any other bijin-ga piece (without knowing what exactly the writing on the piece says.)