This is one of many sets of 千社札 (senshafuda or senjafuda) in the Mokuhankan collection.

General information about senshafuda

Senshafuda had their origin as simple prayer 'labels' which were hung/pasted on or around shrine buildings. Over the course of many centuries, they morphed into a more decorative form including colourful imagery, and became a very collectible item, much the way that postage stamps or trading cards would be in some other cultures.

But one difference with the senshafuda is that the groups of collectors would actually produce the items themselves. A group of collectors would carefully plan out a new set, collecting design ideas, and of course the money for producing the prints. A printmaking workshop would be commissioned to make the actual prints (most frequently in batches of 200), and the finished sets would be disturbed among the group members.

Many senshafuda sets are designed to include the nicknames of the group members, and we see that in this set too ...

This set

The theme chosen by the group members was clearly a collection of looks at what happens 'behind the scenes' at a theater. The opening and closing panels - designed as a 'four-up', taking the space of four normal fuda - include a listing of 20 group member's nicknames, and the lanterns at the top of each design carry more.

There is a kind of 'colophon' page at the end, which has one of the sponsor's names - 家安 (Ieyasu) - featured prominently; perhaps he was the leader of this particular project ...