Autumn special exhibition The Hiroshima Panels, Kyoto Museum for World Peace

Kyoto Museum for World Peace, Ritsumeikan UniversityKinugasa

The Hiroshima Panels: A Place to Think Together about the Future

Last chance1 October 2026 – 30 November 2026¥400

Five original Hiroshima Panels by Iri and Toshi Maruki, shown in Kyoto for the first time in 42 years, with 61 items incl. documents found in 2025 and the 1953 film.

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On now All of November 2026

In the first panel, Ghosts, a procession of burned people walks with their hands half raised and their skin hanging like rags. Somewhere in it a baby sleeps alone, its face unmarked. Iri and Toshi Maruki painted it in 1950, after going into Hiroshima just after the bomb, and kept at the series for 32 years.

Five of the fifteen are here, each a pair of folding screens 1.8 by 7.2 metres, from Ghosts to Crows (1972). You stand close enough to compare how the painters' eye changed between the 1950s and the 1970s. It is the first time the originals have been shown in Kyoto in 42 years, lent while the Maruki Gallery in Saitama is closed for renovation. The show has 61 items in all, including 1950s documents found at the gallery and published in June 2025.

The show is in the Nakano Memorial Hall. The 400 yen ticket also covers the permanent exhibition and the Mugonkan annex. Last entry is 16:00, and it is closed on Sundays.

Editor's pick

Five original Hiroshima Panels by Iri and Toshi Maruki, shown in Kyoto for the first time in 42 years, with 61 items including documents found in 2025 and the 1953 film.

Look for

Ghosts (1950)
Look for the procession of burned figures with hands half raised and skin hanging like rags, and the baby asleep alone among them, its face untouched.
Petition (1955)
Children, parents, old people and workers of every trade line up to sign the anti-bomb petition that started with mothers in Suginami, Tokyo.
Crows (1972)
Crows descend on the bodies of Korean victims, left unburied longest, while a chima and jeogori fly off toward the Korean sky.
The 1953 film The Hiroshima Panels
A 17-minute documentary of the Marukis at work and the panels on tour, narrated with what 1950s audiences said after seeing them.

Good for

Cheap Culture
Nerding Out
Out-Of-Town Guests

Skip if

You want to avoid graphic images: the panels show burned, dying and dead bomb victims.

With kids

Elementary pupils pay 200 yen and secondary students 300 yen. The panels show burned and dead bodies, including a baby and crows at corpses, so talk younger children through it first.