Weeeeee.

A new place to explore! I was sad I wasn’t at the grand opening of the National Gallery last November. We finally got to visit earlier and it was WOW. Impressive!

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Feeling guide ako today.

Getting there. Take the MRT to Cityhall and look for Exit B. At ground level, follow the signs and covered walkway which leads around the corner to National Gallery Singapore.

Entrance fee. The ticketing area is located at the basement level of the gallery. For non-Singaporeans the entrance fee is SGD 20.00. However, I thought it was a better bargain to get the “Gallery Insider” package, at SGD 45.00, which has unlimited access to the permanent galleries for a whole year (apart from other usual perks of “membership”).

The National Gallery Singapore was built to combine two iconic Singapore buildings which are the Supreme Court and the City Hall. For our first trip to the National Gallery, we visited the exhibits at the Supreme Court section.

The building is spacious and contrary to this bitchy review I read on Facebook, the galleries are of reasonable size. They don’t feel cramped at all– at least not the sections we were enjoying.

We visited the art galleries featuring works from the 18th, 19th, and 20th centuries and covering those that came from throughout Southeast Asia. I’m not sure if it was a stroke of luck but we encountered a fair amount of artwork from Filipino artists. There were several as well from Indonesia, Thailand, and Malaysia. Such celebration of Southeast Asian art!

In one room we ran into artwork from Juan Luna and Félix Resurrección Hidalgo. OMG.

We’re looking forward to visiting again soon. 🙂