Catch Paw-verbs on the Lawn at the Malay Heritage Centre
Five resident cats - Oreo, Ginger, Sneaky, Truffles and Tam - regularly greet visitors at the Malay Heritage Centre (MHC).
Starting from yesterday until May 30, visitors will also come across 30 cat standees and 10 others highlighting common Malay proverbs.
All are part of MHC's latest installation on their lawn, Paw-verbs on the Lawn.
The 10 standees showcasing Malay proverbs will highlight how cats are used in Malay literary culture to convey different aspects of human behaviour and impart age-old lessons.
Some of these proverbs include "seperti anjing dengan kucing" (like a dog with a cat) to reference two people who always quarrel, or "malu-malu kucing" (like a shy cat) to describe someone pretending to be shy.
The 30 cat standees were designed by Japanese artist Juno, who specialises in vivid illustrations of cats and has more than 300,000 followers on Instagram to date. This is her first collaboration with MHC and the first time her work has been featured in South-east Asia.
MHC is housed at the Istana Kampong Gelam, a former Malay palace that was gazetted as a national monument in 2015. The centre showcases the history, culture and contributions of the Malay community in Singapore.
The latest exhibition will feature fringe activities including eight performative storytelling sessions which touch on how cats are embedded in the Malay language.
Tickets cost $10 and the sessions will be performed in English and Malay. The exhibition is open to the public until May 30.
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