I recently visited the newly reopened Malay Heritage Centre at Kampong Glam (Singapore) following an almost two-year closure for extensive renovations. These are my broad observations of the current exhibition when I visited on 10 July 2026.
This is not an open letter, just my personal reflections as a visitor.
(Update: I was asked for my thoughts, so I shared this verbatim to the folks at MHC on 25 August 2026)
Some background and context
- I recently completed a museum project with a government ministry, working alongside architects, exhibition designers, copywriters and filmmakers, which was my department, for almost two years.
- I cannot name or identify the project because of an NDA, but the experience gave me some insight into how museum narratives, visitor journeys and exhibits are developed.
- I visited the new Malay Heritage Centre with a non-Malay friend who enjoys museums. I deliberately brought her along because she did not already know many of the Malay cultural and historical anchor points presented in the galleries.
- After completing the rather confusing narrative trail, I could eventually understand the direction the museum was trying to take. The problem was getting there.
1. Wayfinding and the Visitor Journey
No clear starting point
- It was not always clear where each gallery began or in which direction visitors were expected to move.
- Because of the gallery layouts, I often found myself entering at what appeared to be the end of an exhibit.
- I then had to walk backwards or retrace my steps to find the intended starting point.
The narrative chronology gets lost
- This affected more than navigation. It disrupted the storytelling.
- Once the sequence was lost, it became difficult to understand how one exhibit, idea or period was meant to lead into the next.
- The design should guide visitors instinctively. They should not have to stop and work out where the story begins.
2. The Emotional Connection Is Missing
I understood the information, but did not necessarily feel it
- For me, a strong museum experience should go beyond presenting facts and objects. It should create an emotional connection between the visitor and the history.
- When I visited the Australian War Memorial in Canberra, I came away genuinely affected by the stories of the young Australian Allied soldiers who died in Singapore.
- I understood the idealism of these young men who left home, perhaps hoping to see the world, only to be failed by the brutal reality of war.
- Their sacrifice did not feel like the story of one heroic individual. It felt like an ensemble sacrifice involving many ordinary young men.
- That experience stayed with me so strongly that it eventually informed a film I wrote about another famous wartime event, the Battle of Bukit Chandu.
The displays feel more presentational than affecting
- At the Malay Heritage Centre, I did not feel that same sense of connection, pride or emotional discovery.
- Much of the history remained behind the glass, supported by vintage-looking displays and explanatory text, but it did not always feel alive or personally relatable.
- My non-Malay friend was left quite confused. I found myself explaining far more of the historical and cultural context than I felt I should have needed to.
- A museum should reward visitors who already know the history, but it must also bring along those encountering it for the first time.
3. Exhibits and Interpretation
The objects need a clearer place within the story
- The exhibits suffered from the unclear wayfinding and uneven captioning.
- Because I lost the intended chronology, I sometimes encountered objects before understanding why they were important.
- I then had to return to the actual beginning of the gallery and reconstruct the intended narrative for myself.
Gallery 5 needs stronger contextualisation
- The artefacts in Gallery 5 may be historically significant, but I suspect many visitors will still be asking: Why should I care about these objects?
- The captions should do more than identify an artefact. They should explain:
- Why is it here?
- What does it tell us about Malay history or identity?
- Whose life does it represent?
- How does it connect to the other exhibits?
- Why should it matter to a visitor today?
4. Copywriting and Captioning
More facts do not always produce greater clarity
- Some of the copy could be sharper and more purposeful.
- The writing should clearly establish why an object, person or event has been included and how it contributes to the larger gallery narrative.
- At times, the captions explain what something is without communicating why it matters.
- The individual texts may contain useful information, but they do not always build towards a coherent whole.
5. Main Takeaway from Each Gallery
What should visitors leave remembering?
- The key message of each gallery feels somewhat convoluted.
- By the end of a section, I was not always certain what its central takeaway was supposed to be.
- Each gallery needs a simple narrative spine: one clear idea that visitors can understand, remember and carry into the next space.
- The museum contains many potentially meaningful stories. The challenge is giving those stories greater focus and hierarchy.
6. The Film Gallery
The current argument feels too superficial
- My friend and I are both filmmakers, with professional credits involving film history and filmmaking techniques. We found the main narrative presented in this gallery rather superficial.
- The female stars of that era were specifically chosen for their beauty, screen presence and charisma. Their screen roles also followed familiar heroine tropes adapted largely from Indian cinema.
- This does not diminish their talent. These women held their own as performers and often had tremendous screen presence.
- However, within many of the films themselves, the female characters were still positioned mainly in relation to the male hero. At least, that is what appears on screen.
- The “women as industry engines” argument needs evidence
- The film gallery makes a rather sweeping assertion about women as engines of the film industry, without presenting enough historical evidence to sustain that argument.
- If the gallery wants to argue that these women were not merely stars or narrative devices, but important engines of the film industry, then that argument needs stronger support.
- Are there interviews, archival documents, production records or credible first-hand accounts demonstrating their influence behind the scenes?
- Without such evidence, the present interpretation feels imposed retrospectively rather than convincingly drawn from the historical material.
A stronger angle may already be available
- Another approach would be to examine Singapore as a progressive regional centre for filmmaking and the arts during that period.
- If “progressiveness” is the gallery’s main argument, it could explore how Singapore became a place where artists from Malaya, Sumatra and the wider region gathered, collaborated and expressed themselves.
- During my own research for a Mediacorp documentary about Jalan Ampas, I found a valuable oral-history interview with S. Kadarisman in the National Archives. He was outspoken and gave a vivid account of what was happening within the Jalan Ampas film community.
- The community was not simply Singaporean in the narrow modern sense. It was part of a wider Malayan cultural world, drawing artists and workers from present-day Malaysia, Sumatra and elsewhere in the region.
- Under British rule, the arts were largely allowed to flourish as long as artists did not cross certain legal or political boundaries.
- Singapore consequently became a space where regional artists could gather, experiment and express themselves with fewer cultural parameters.
- To me, that is a richer and more historically grounded story: Singapore as a thriving regional meeting point where Malay cinema, music, performance and popular culture could grow.
Overall Takeaway
- I eventually understood what the museum was trying to achieve, but the visitor journey made that understanding harder than necessary.
- The main issue is not a lack of material. There are many valuable artefacts, personalities and histories here.
- What is missing is a clearer narrative journey, stronger emotional connection and more persuasive explanation of why these histories should matter, especially to visitors who do not already know the context.
- A heritage centre should not require a Malay visitor to act as an unofficial guide for a non-Malay companion. The galleries themselves should be doing that work.
EDIT: I truly enjoyed the immersive wayang kulit room and the videos. However the videos tend to suffer from pacing and unneccesarily, meandering narrative at some parts.
