This project examines how photography impacted the treatment of temporality in Japanese actor prints of the early Meiji era. Looking to a selection of Meiji actor prints by artists such as Toyohara Kunichika housed at the National Library in Canberra, this project considers how popular yakusha-e of the latter nineteenth century countered the influence of photography, particularly through experimentations with time. How did these later prints splice, enfold, and hyperbolise time in actor portraits? Through a close examination of temporality, this project examines how kabuki prints of the Meiji era challenged the photographic portrait by visually playing with time.