Thursday, 3:00pm
10 September 2026
Kitching in Kyoto
Alan Kitching's first full scale exhibition in Japan brings a vast array of his work to an international audience
Alan Kitching has had a long and eventful creative life. His latest adventure is a big exhibition at the ddd gallery in Kyoto, Japan, entitled ‘Alan Kitching: Living Legacy of Letterpress’. The show features more than 80 works that span his career from the 1960s to earlier this year.
Kitching’s working life began as a teenage apprentice in Darlington, and blossomed over the ensuing decades with broadsides, typographic maps and colourful posters based on literature, theatre and music. The show is at Kyoto’s ddd gallery until 21 October 2026.
Exhibition poster designed by Alan Kitching, with Tsugumi Arai (1Q). Top. A view of the Kyoto ddd gallery exhibition ‘Alan Kitching: Living Legacy of Letterpress’.
Kitching is renowned as one of the leading practitioners of letterpress typography and printmaking. Over the past 70 years he has been creating works that display his signature expressive style, which is colourful for the most part, experimenting with scale, typography and dynamic compositions. With a career that has spanned graphic design, writing, education, printmaking and more, he has produced renowned commissions, books, posters, stamps, iconic self-initiated work and limited-edition prints for a host of international clients.
A view of the exhibition, which features a variety of Kitching’s work from 1969 to now.
The exhibition catalogue essay is by Eye editor John L. Walters, also the author of the biography Alan Kitching: A Life in Letterpress (Laurence King, 2016), art directed by Eye’s Simon Esterson.
Alan Kitching, published by ggg Books, shown with and without belly band. Design: Tsugumi Arai (1Q). This is number 146 in a long-running series that includes catalogues for Tadanori Yokoo (28) and Why Not Associates (104).
Walters writes: ‘A decade later, it has been a delight to refresh my memory of Alan’s “greatest hits”, catching up with the latest work from his studio in Kennington, south London. The selection that makes up this ddd exhibition, spanning the period 1969 to 2026, includes a handful of prints I had never seen before – the powerful designs Kitching made for Khadi, an Arabic restaurant in London, printed on coloured paper stocks as light as tissue paper.’
The late Celia Stothard with Alan Kitching in their Kennington studio, 2009. Photo: Philip Sayer. See ‘The show must go on’ in Eye 74.
‘Certain themes and subjects recur in Kitching’s work: poetry, music, theatre, people, places and typographic maps – a form he has made his own. Prints based on individual’s names and lives include Dr Johnson’s London, Capability Brown, Musical Types, Berthold Wolpe, the simple, symmetrical beauty of Yukiko and, most significantly, Celia Sings, a tribute to his artistic soulmate and wife Celia Stothard (1949-2010), whose passionate involvement enabled Kitching’s studio to acquire the huge Wrington collection of theatrical wood type.‘
Installation view of ‘Alan Kitching: Living Legacy of Letterpress’.
This display at ddd gallery contains typographic maps and broadsides by Kitching.
For more about Alan Kitching and his work see ‘Marks on paper’ in Eye 15 and ‘The show must go on’ in Eye 74.
Event details:
Gallery address
kyoto ddd gallery, 3F COCON KARASUMA, 620 Suiginya-cho, Karasuma-dori Shijo-sagaru, Shimogyo-ku, Kyoto City 600 8411, Japan
Hours and closures
Tuesday-Friday: 11:00am-7:00pm
Saturdays, Sundays, and National Holidays: 11:00am-6:00pm
Closed: Mondays
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