National Gallery Singapore

Today we visited the National Gallery of Singapore.  And what a showcase.  The buildings used to be the City Hall and the Supreme Court.   Absolutely magnificent buildings.  They face the Padang and the Cricket Club so the setting was also very  grand.

The buildings were joined together, with a glass roof, and wooden floors.  The centre is a huge atrium.   There were two walkways between the buildings, on the 3rd and 4th floors.   The National Gallery opened in 2007.

We were especially interested in the temporary exhibition titled 'Artist and Empire', which explores art from the British Empire over the past 400 years, and its impact on the rise of modern art in former colonies such as Singapore.

Interestingly there was a different version of this exhibition which was presented at Tate Britain, in November 2015.  A much more positive exhibition, from Britain's point of view.

There was no doubt that the message in this exhibition focussed on the consequences and the impact on the people who lived in the colonies under British rule.  As well as artworks produced by British artists for British patrons, which reflected  Empire-centric viewpoints of the time, there were also contemporary artworks which offered a counter prospective.

I found the sculpture of four soldiers, in the photograph below very thought provoking.  The sign explained that in the late 1800s, British soldiers killed Zula tribesmen in a war, which was celebrated as a success in England.   Yet how would the people of London feel if Zulu tribesmen had stormed into their city and killed the men there.  The sign asked people to think about the justifications of invading countries.

Two statues in England, photographed and embellished (painted on) with the men's wealth, mainly gold coins and gold artifacts.  The one on the left was a slave trader.   My apologies, as I have forgotten their names.

We continued around the general exhibitions which focussed mainly on artists from Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia and China.  Some pieces were very modern, some traditional.  They were all very interesting.

We also were quite taken in by the building itself.

The room where the Prime Minister, Lee Kuan Yew, and his cabinet, were sworn into office.

The atrium between the two buildings.

The law library,  when the building was the supreme court.

Long corridors with magnificent tiled floors.

We went up to the top of the building where there are now restaurants.  We sat and drank our coffee, which was all we could afford, and admired the view.  

The photograph below shows the city buildings on the right and the Marina Bay Sands Hotel in the background.  In the centre of the photo is the padang  where there was an international hockey tournament taking place.   The low building on the right is the Cricket Club.

Singapore schools were participating in a music presentation in the artium.  We were very impressed with the high quality of instrumentalists taking part in the presentation.

 Today we walked 14,763 steps (11 kms), mostly around the huge National Gallery.  It was a very interesting day, and we certainly went away very impressed with the gallery, and with more of an understanding of different ways of looking at the British Empire.