Art Around Every Corner

One of the things we love about Penang is its passion for street art—everything from murals covering the sides of multistory buildings to small paintings tucked into the corners of random alleys. The last time we were here, in 2014, we posted a photo gallery of Penang street art that included some of the most famous pieces in George Town. Some of those are still around, others have succumbed to property development or the weather, and many new ones have popped up. The photos below are of street paintings that we didn’t see on our previous visit.

Penang’s street art craze took off four years ago, when a Lithuanian artist, Ernest Zacharevic, was commissioned to paint some murals around George Town. They feature children playing or adults in traditional Penang occupations, such as rickshaw driver or fisherman. Those scenes became so popular that they encouraged other artists to try their hand, and now there are street paintings all over George Town. Many of them incorporate three-dimensional objects (a swing set, a bicycle, a chair) or make use of the features (windows, holes, pipes) of the walls where they’re painted. The most famous paintings are marked on tourist maps and reproduced on all kinds of souvenirs.

Street art is a transient medium. Paintings done on plaster over brick buildings are vulnerable to the humid climate (like old frescos in Italian churches) as well as to the bright sunlight and to being rubbed by tourists jostling to get pictures taken in front of them. As older paintings fade away, new ones constantly appear. You’ll turn the corner of a street you’ve walked down a dozen times before and see some new piece of art on a wall. Before anyone was hunting Pokemon characters, visitors and residents regularly roamed the streets of George Town hunting new street paintings.

One of the best places to hunt is the Hin Bus Depot, an old falling-down bus station that has been repurposed as an art space. Muralists have painted the walls of the ruined buildings, and the intact buildings have been turned into art studios and gallery space. Every weekend there’s a market where artists sell their work. The place embodies George Town’s fun and funky vibe. (And of course, in this cafe-mad city, it includes not one but two coffee shops.)

Chris under the backbend girl

The craze for street art has spread beyond the heart of George Town. We’ve stumbled on street paintings in the suburbs on the way back to our house. And during our bus trip around Penang last week, we were delighted to see four beautiful, very new looking portrait murals in the back of beyond: the town of Balik Pulau, whose name means “the back of the island.” The mural we were able to photograph (because the bus stopped there) is at the end of the photo gallery below.

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