Exhibitions in Kyoto

The Museum of Kyoto

Original paintings by comedian-turned-painter Jimmy Onishi, exploring the places that shape his work, with new pieces painted in Kyoto as his "hometown".

The Museum of Kyoto

Marking 250 years since Ike no Taiga's death: the Kyoto literati painter who stayed among ordinary townspeople, shown with works by the artists he influenced.

The Museum of Kyoto

Highlights of the Paleological Association of Japan's collection, which once ran the Heian Museum on this site and helped found the museum, marking a new catalogue.

Kyoto Museum of Crafts and DesignFree

Five Kyoto women hand-painted yuzen dyers show and sell kimono, obi and accessories, explaining their work in person. MOCAD Gallery.

Kyoto City KYOCERA Museum of Art

Studio Ghibli-produced follow-up to Zen and Ghibli: calligraphy and paintings by Edo-period Zen monk Hakuin Ekaku, paired with new video content.

Kyoto City KYOCERA Museum of Art

Kyoto leg of Japan's largest public juried exhibition: about 500 works in nihonga, Western painting, sculpture, crafts and calligraphy.

Kyoto National Museum

New Year feature for the 2027 zodiac: how sheep, rarely seen in Japan, were nonetheless pictured in Japanese art. Gallery 2F-2.

Kyoto National Museum

Famed tea utensils shown with the boxes and silk pouches handed down with them, including the National Treasure Ido tea bowl "Kizaemon".

Kyoto City KYOCERA Museum of Art

Immersive exhibition exploring Zen through Studio Ghibli films, built around Hayao Miyazaki's The Boy and the Heron, in the Higashiyama Cube.

Kyoto City KYOCERA Museum of Art

Collection display on the museum's 1933 founding as the Kyoto Enthronement Memorial Museum of Art, with its earliest acquisitions and archive material.

Kyoto Museum of Crafts and DesignFree

27 objects from 17 Kyoto university museums, chosen around handcraft, mark the Kyoto University Museum Network's 15th year. WEST SQUARE Window Gallery.

Museum "EKi" KYOTO

Retrospective of Finnish designer Kaj Franck (1911–1989), maker of Kilta, Teema and Kartio: glass and ceramics from the Design Museum Helsinki, his ties to Japan and designers he influenced.

Kyoto Railway Museum

For the museum's 10th anniversary, 22 collection photographs of the guest trains brought in on the siding for special displays, including the 113 Series C5 set (2023).

Kyoto Prefectural Insho-Domoto Museum of Fine Arts

60th-anniversary show on how Domoto Insho painted women across his career, from entertainment-district women in his youth to modern works like Takamine Hideko in Black.

Kyoto City KYOCERA Museum of ArtFree

Free show in The Triangle: installations, sculpture and drawings turning wallpaper, rubber bands and graffiti into studies of lines, shadows and ground.

Kyoto City KYOCERA Museum of Art

First retrospective in 40 years of Kyoto weaver Yamaga Seika, whose handwoven brocades range from Gion Festival tapestries to locomotives and Tokyo Tower.

Sen-oku Hakuko Kan

Shang and Zhou bronzes cast with ancient Chinese inscriptions (jinwen), the earliest forms of today's characters, read as calligraphy and as historical record.

Sen-oku Hakuko Kan

Modern Japanese-style and Western-style paintings and crafts collected by Sumitomo Shunsui, traced chronologically through his friendships with the artists of his day.

Raku Museum

How the chrysanthemum, emblem of the noble recluse, was painted and carved on Raku tea bowls across the generations, some pieces predating the Edo-period chrysanthemum craze.

The Kyoto University Museum

Centenary tribute to primatologist and anthropologist Junichiro Itani: field notebooks, manuscripts, photos and objects from African hunter-gatherers and herders.

Kyoto Museum of Crafts and Design

Kyoto craft skills reimagined as contemporary products and design, plus a parallel show on materials and techniques from five Kyoto makers.

Kyoto Railway Museum

Archive photos of how the museum came to be: construction, trains being moved in and installed, and the halls at the 2016 opening.

Kyoto Railway Museum

Steam locomotives and station buildings of early 20th-century Kyoto, shown with scenes from the anime Eureka Evrika as part of the museum's collaboration with the series.

The Museum of Kyoto

Original manga art and figures by Go Nagai that survived the 2024 Noto earthquake fire at his Wajima memorial museum, plus new drawings made for the show.

Kahitsukan – Kyoto Museum of Contemporary Art

60 signed original prints from the collection by Magnum photographer Martine Franck: children, portraits, Tory Island in Ireland, and intimate shots of her husband Henri Cartier-Bresson.

The National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto (MoMAK)

The next rotation of MoMAK's collection displays, running alongside the jewellery exhibition; themes include the museum's outdoor sculptures.

Fukuda Art Museum

The museum's first shunga show debuts the 14th-century Chigo Sōshi scroll, with Hokusai's Nami Chidori and love-themed works by Uemura Shōen. Ages 18+ only.

The National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto (MoMAK)

About 350 pieces tracing post-war Japanese art jewellery, from the JJDA founders to contemporary makers, with works by Otto Künzli and others.

Nijo Castle (Nijo-jo)

Original murals from the Kuroshoin, where the shogunate feasted the imperial court in 1626: cherry blossoms and pheasants in full spring colour beneath ink landscapes of ancient China.

Kyoto International Manga MuseumFree

Four decades of manga reception in France, Belgium, Spain, Italy and Germany, plus work by European artists who grew up reading it. A 20th-anniversary show.

Kyoto Railway Museum

Kyoto Station 150th anniversary show on railway architecture: four generations of Kyoto Station and their architects, roundhouse drawings and historic station buildings.

Hosomi Museum

Storybook-themed porcelain designed and painted by Heinz Werner, master artist of the modern Meissen manufactory.

Kyoto International Manga MuseumFree

Director Aramata Hiroshi's 20th-anniversary show imagining a future Kyoto shared with aliens and gods, premiering Baron Yoshimoto's 100 alien skull portraits.

Saga Arashiyama Museum of Arts & Culture

Early-modern and modern paintings of Kyoto's sights, festivals, geiko and vegetables, from Hara Zaichū's Aoi Festival scroll to sweet-shop wrappers by Tomioka Tessai.

Nijo Castle (Nijo-jo)

Painted cedar doors of pines and cranes by a Tsurusawa School artist (1800), from the Goshoin's western corridor, one of the palace's 14 door sets shown one at a time.