The Kansai region is home to a number of fine museums and art galleries, and is arguably one of the most important museum centers of Japan. In particular, three of the seven national museums of Japan (Kyoto National Museum, National Museum of Ethnology, and the Nara National Museum) and two of the five national museums of Japan (The National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto and the National Museum of Art, Osaka) are located within the Kansai region. These are complemented by a wide variety of public and private museums and art galleries, such as the Hyogo Prefectural Museum of Art designed by world-renowned architect Ando Tadao, also the Otsuka Museum of Art, famous as the “Museum of Ceramic Masterpieces” in Tokushima Prefecture, and other attractive architectural art facilities.

Osaka’s National Museum of Art regularly holds contemporary art exhibitions, while in Kobe, works by representative Japanese artist Yokoo Tadanori are featured in the Yokoo Tadanori Museum of Contemporary Art. Kobe City’s popular Rokkosan stages an annual “Rokko Meets Art Walk” every autumn. Meanwhile, the world-famed photographer Shoji Ueda Photography Museum (Tottori Prefecture) continues to be of great interest to photographers.

The Kansai region has many places related to manga and anime. Takarazuka City's Osamu Tezuka Manga Museum, dedicated to one of Japan's leading manga artists Osamu Tezuka, Tottori Prefecture’s Gosho Aoyama Manga Factory, honoring Aoyama Gosho, creator of the popular Detective Conan series, and the Kyoto International Manga Museum are among the many facilities where manga and anime are celebrated. Besides these renowned anime institutions, there are also places where anime has been immortalized, such as the Galaxy Express 999 in Fukui Prefecture’s Tsuruga City, and Detective Conan in Hokuei Town, Tottori Prefecture. There are many anime shops located in Osaka’s Nipponbashi area, and the popular figure museums in Nagahama, Shiga and Tottori Prefecture’s Kurayoshi are also highly recommended.