The son of an icon painter, he enrolled at the National Academy of Arts in the capital Sofia when he was 25, where he studied mural painting in 1940–1945 under Dechko Uzunov.
After leaving the National Academy of Arts shortly before graduation, Kanchev took part in exhibitions and biennales in Bulgaria and abroad over the next 22 years, including Belgrade, Budapest, Berlin, Moscow, Warsaw, Brno, Ljubljana and New York City.
During this time, individual exhibitions of his work were organized in Sofia, Moscow, Prague, Berlin, Warsaw and Budapest, among other cities.
[3] In 1967 when he was 52, Kanchev participated in an AIGA (American Institute of Graphic Arts) international exhibition in which he presented 23 of his logos, including his Petrol AD trademark.
At the age of 79 in 1994 he was named among the world's top ten trademark artists along with Paul Rand and Saul Bass.