Singapore’s Most Inspiring Art Museums and Galleries

Singapore has become a hot travel destination for art lovers with numerous exhibitions popping up across the city, often displayed to great effect in beautifully converted colonial spaces. Here’s your definitive guide to exploring Singapore’s burgeoning art scene.

ArtScience Museum

A place where art, science, technology and culture meet, the interactive ArtScience Museum appeals to kids and grown-ups alike. The permanent exhibition Future World is an invitation to have fun, play, explore and to reflect on our relationship with the environment, technology and the people around us.

The Best Art Museums and Galleries in Singapore

National Gallery Singapore

Housed in two beautifully restored national monuments, City Hall and the former Supreme Court, the National Gallery is home to the largest public collection of modern art in South-East Asia, alongside an impressive program of special exhibitions from around the world.

STPI Gallery

Step inside this striking 19th-century warehouse of STPI Gallery on Robertson Quay and you’ll find the traditional arts of printmaking and papermaking are very much alive and well. It’s more than just a gallery, with frequent artist collaborations and public programs; sign up for a workshop and create your own prints.

Arndt Singapore

Hailing from Berlin, the contemporary art gallery Arndt expanded into the Asia region’s flourishing art-scape in 2013, focusing on Chinese, Indonesian, Indian and Philippine art across a range of media. Arndt hosts pop-up exhibitions in Singapore with two scheduled in early 2018 at The Arts House at the Old Parliament.

Gillman Barracks

Gillman Barracks is a 6.4-hectare former military compound that is now home to 11 international and local art galleries, along with retailers, bars and restaurants. Art lovers can easily spend a day exploring this tranquil enclave that has become the focal point of Singapore’s contemporary art scene.

Ota Fine Arts

Ota opened a second gallery in Singapore after making a name for itself in Japan for fostering a variety of art forms including contemporary painting, video art and crafts by Japanese, Korean and Chinese artists. The Singapore gallery, housed in Gillman Barracks, focuses on collaborations with new artists from South-East Asia and the Middle East.

ShanghART Singapore

ShanghART Gallery has been a driving force in the development of Chinese contemporary art for the past 20 years, branching out in 2012 with its first international gallery, opening at Gillman Barracks in Singapore. From video art to installations and live performance, alongside more traditional media, expect the delightfully unexpected.

Mizuma Gallery

This established Tokyo-based art gallery opened in Singapore at Gillman Barracks in 2012, in order to promote established Japanese artists in the region, and also introduce emerging young artists from South-East Asia to the international scene.

Yeo Workshop

This cutting-edge gallery at Gillman Barracks takes an alternative curatorial approach, rejecting the barrier between audience and the artwork by presenting wall-hung pieces without frames. Gallery owner Audrey Yeo is passionate about pushing the boundaries of conventional art and promoting emerging local and international conceptual artists, which is reflected in the vibrant exhibitions in her gallery.

Yavuz Gallery

The artworks featured at Yavuz Gallery at Gillman Barracks are first and foremost driven by the gallery’s commitment to thought-provoking social commentary. Considerations of nationality, style or artist profile are secondary, resulting in a vibrant, eclectic mix of works by emerging and established artists from the region, but also Iran and Turkey.