Georgetown, on Malaysia’s Penang island, has, in recent years, become quite popular with tourists due to the presence of the many street murals and sculptures that can be found throughout the old quarters of the city.

These often quirky, colourful and engaging wall murals, paintings and installations are not only visually captivating (as witnessed by the many visitors taking selfies and posing in front of them - the smartphone generation and instagram….what do you expect?) but often serve to inform the viewer of some aspect of that location’s history.

Know your history

The many street sculptures/installations that can be found throughout the city tell a specific story about the location in which they are sited. From immigrant communities and notable personalities to trading locations and their history the wealth of background details and cultural information being related through each sculpture is well managed.

I love how the visitor is made aware of Georgetown’s culture and history while engaging with the quirkiness and playful appearance of each artwork. It’s so well done and is such a clever and fantastic way to relate your city’s heritage to not only help generate tourism and engage visitors but also preserve that history for future generations to be able to draw from.

The following are a small selection of some of my favourite Georgetown sculptures/installations…

Coppersmith's street.

Tua Pek Kong Hueon grand float procession.

Tok tok mee.

Chulia Street.

Yeon Kongsi.

Portuguese church meets secret society.

Salt traders street.

Bullock cart wheel.

Acheen Street shipping sculpture.

Victoria Street.

Wall paintings

The colourful wall paintings and murals that many visitors pose in front of started with Lithuanian artist Ernest Zacharevic’s commissioned work for the 2012 Georgetown Festival and have since then grown and expanded to include work from other artists. I think the number of artworks in and around Georgetown is currently somewhere in the region of 100 (although I strongly suspect this will likely increase over coming years given their popularity with both locals and tourists).

The most photographed artwork in the city would be the Kids on Bicycle wall painting which you’ll likely see featured in many articles/instagram posts when researching Penang sights and attractions online. Be warned: you might have a wait before you can take a photograph here - it’s quite popular with visitors. When I visited the location on Armenian Street there were at least 10 others waiting for their photo opportunity!

Some of my favourite wall paintings and murals were…

Boy on Chair.

Boy on motorbike.

Reclining man.

Push.

Some interesting anomalies

Not all of the Georgetown wall adornments consisted of painted images though; some of them were used to relate messages that were sad, humorous, cynical or thought provoking.

This rather prominent message informing the visitor of the death of an apparently much photographed cat and their relation to an animal shelter and sanctuary was both a little sad and an interesting way to commemorate the passing of a clearly much loved local ‘icon’ (not to mention a great way to raise the profile of the sanctuary):

Then there was the wall that was waiting for its turn to become the next visitor attraction….and not feeling a little put out in the meantime:

Finally…the wall that simply refuses to be a team player:

Think you can handle it?

I challenge anyone visiting Georgetown to not want to try locating all of these artworks! Once you come across the first few wall paintings and sculptures it becomes a little addictive to try and find the rest.

I spent a few hours wandering around various streets and encountering many unexpected gems during my tour of the city. I’d love to say that I managed to source each and every one of those artworks but sadly that wasn’t the case…maybe next time I get to visit the island!

For those who are interested this Google Map claims to list the location of each artwork.