Headed up to Penang for a quick weekend getaway? Besides great food culture, you can’t miss the colourful alleyways of the famous George Town, with its many walls covered with murals and street art. I put together this detailed walking guide with some recommended routes to help you find all the Penang street art in George Town on your own.
Post updated: Dec 2017
Map and Recommended Routes
There has been quite a boom of street art in Penang since 2012 when I first created this post. To make things easier, I’ve plotted out the locations on this Google Map and recommended some routes in different colours that you can follow when exploring George Town on your own.
If you are feeling adventurous, I have another guide to help you venture outside of Georgetown Core and other parts of Penang for more street art!
Penang Street Art Projects
The street art in Penang has largely been a result of these street art projects or special events.
Ernest Zacharevic works
This Lithuanian artist is probably the reason why street art became such a big deal to Penang in the first place, after his commissioned work ‘Mirrors George Town’ for the George Town Festival back in 2012 became a big hit. His works are by far the most popular out of all the street art I saw, with queues forming to take pictures with these works and appearing on souvenirs quite prominently. He recently had a solo exhibition in early 2014 titled Art is Rubbish is Art, and now has works that can be found in various part of Malaysia, Singapore and Europe.

101 Lost Kittens
This collection of 12 cat-related street artworks is a project by Thai artist Natthapon Muangkliang and Malaysian artists Louise Low and Tang Yeok Khang aimed at creating awareness towards stray animals. Here’s a quite detailed blogpost about where you can find all the 101 Lost Kittens artworks.

Urban Exchange 2014 and 2015
Creative space Hin Bus Depot and Urban Nation organizes an annual urban arts festival that invites both local Malaysian and prominent overseas street arts to Penang to transform the buildings with murals and street art. Beyond murals, it also brings together contemporary art and outdoor art installations to the streets of Penang.

Marking George Town
These 52 iron structures can be found in abundance throughout George Town, and were actually commissioned by the Penang Tourism Board to provide a fun pictoral anecdote about the history of the street it is located on, and is a rather fun way to learn a little bit about Penang’s heritage. I don’t cover that in here because the locations are already pretty well documented by the Tourism Board.

Others
There are many different street artworks besides those listed above, some by random artists and others commissioned by the local tenants. I tried my best to find out info about these artists and credit them accordingly here, but if you do have updates, please let me know!
Resources
- I highly recommend you pick up the Marking George Town map by Penang’s tourism board from the airport as a hard copy guide to Penang’s street art
- Another handy resource I used for my 2016 trip is Travel2Penang, which is pretty detailed and the street view maps were simultaneously useful yet hard to read somehow
*Remember that street art is transient and ever-changing and I might have overlooked some spots!
Route 1 (Orange)
Lebuh Ah Quee
Start from Lebuh Cannon junction and walk down towards Jalan Pantai junction.






Lebuh Pantai
Turn left at the Lebuh Pantai junction. Walk past Gat Lebuh Chulia junction. Before you reach Lebuh Pasar, you should come across a carpark on your left where you should see these two artworks quite easily:


Gat Lebuh Chulia
Turn back down Lebuh Pantai and walk towards Gat Lebuh Chulia. Turn left and walk towards Pengkalan Weld aka Weld Quay.


*on the opposite of Gat Lebuh Chulia is another alleyway. Within that one you can see another of Louis Gan’s murals, which show two kids playing basketball. I missed that this time around!
Route 2 (Red)
Chew Jetty
After you are done with the orange route above, continue walking down Gat Lebuh Chulia till you reach Pengkalan Weld. Turn right and walk down the road (away from the Bus interchange). You should pass various jetty entrances, stop and turn in the one that says Chew Jetty.


Gat Lebuh Armenian
Backtrack towards Pengkalan Weld and cross the road. Gat Lebuh Armenian should be directly opposite. Walk straight up the road towards Lebuh Armenian.





*another 101 Lost Kittens work entitled ‘Please care and bathe me’ is somewhere around here, though I couldn’t find it!
Lebuh Armenian
After Gat Lebuh Armenian, cross the Lebuh Pantai junction towards Lebuh Armenian and walk all the way up. You will need to make a minor detour towards Lorong Soo Hong. This road is closed to vehicular traffic on weekends.










Route 3 (Yellow)
Lebuh Cannon
From Lebuh Armenian junction, turn left and walk down Lebuh Cannon.


Lorong Lumut


Lorong Toh Aka



Route 4 (Green)
Lebuh Stewart
Ok I didn’t link this walk with the other three as it is a little bit further away. Start from Jalan Masjid Kepitan Keling and walk along Lorong Stewart.

Jalan Muntri



Lebuh Chulia


If you have any additions or corrections, do drop me a comment or an email please! I created this guide based on my own experiences and research, so I may have missed out some things or gotten locations wonky, so do help me make this guide better!
Whew if you covered all that, that is a lot of walking indeed! Now how about heading outside of the core George Town area – we’ll be exploring outer areas like the south-western Balik Pulau, and even across to mainland Penang! Or check out some of my other Penang posts.
Looking for more street art? Check out my dedicated street art page.
I loved Penang, and we spent there a week – two weeks in George town but still i haven’t seen some of the murals you have posted ;)
Hope you have a chance to return and see them! There are plenty of murals outside of George Town as well :)
Excellent article! I loved this piece and the detailed info. I believe you ventured far beyond the more well known street artworks and showed some hidden gems.
Thanks Ayush I hope it helped you find some cool works :)
Thanks so much for this post – I managed to find so much of the art this week because of it! Unfortunately a couple are starting to fade even more but as you said, there are lots of new ones too! Great post :)
thanks, good to know! well street art is everchanging, so the fun part is seeing what new works pop up over time :)
I will be there tomorrow :) for 2 days. Thank you so much for the intricate directions! full information is here! Thank you Thank you.
have fun and glad you found the guide useful!
I’m kinda disappointed to be in Penang with someone who’s grumpy all the time about walking despite the fact that I’ve told her more than once that Penang holiday was going to be all about walking long before booking our flight.
Now I’m flying back home without photographing any of the paintings. :(
Thank you for the detailed post I can at least enjoy the painting through your camera.
Well some people just don’t like walking unfortunately! Hopefully you have a chance to come back next time on your own :)
I know how you feel. I think you have to come back to Penang next time :)
Hi I loved the articles and photos.
Appreciate the detailed article. Must visit again to catch the ones with kids. Wish they will be preserved.
Thanks Cher! There’s some new stuff up now though, gotta go back again some time :)
“I want pau” mural art is painted by malaysia artist, wk setor (which u can find his signature under the painted window). TQ
thanks Lily, guess I must have missed it! :)
Thank you so much for such an informative post! We head to Penang in September x Bron
Have an awesome time in Penang! I hope to go back again soon and update this post :)
Thanks for this post Jaclynn! I will be heading to Penang in May and am so excited to look for the street art because I’m a huge fan (: I went on the London Shoreditch Art Tour too (http://www.etsyexplores.com/alternative-london-street-art-walking-tour-in-shoreditch/) and will definitely want to try out the spray-paint option in future (: Keep travelling and writing!
Thanks! The workshop was definitely quite fun especially because it’s not something you get to do every day. Have fun in Penang! :)
The please care and bathe me cats were down the driveway/alley where the rat was hiding around the corner from the big cat. They were really cute! :) I think I missed the cats and humans living together one too and I missed that minion post! haha
Thanks for the tips Cailin! Guess it gives me something to go back and check out :)
I can’t believe I missed Kung Fu Girl still argh~
Love this! I was in Georgetown in December, unfortunately I was super sick upon arrival and did not get to do much wandering about. I loved all the street art I did see and am glad to see more of it here on your site! :)
Thanks for your comment! It sucks that you were sick, but am glad I managed to let you have a peek from my blog :) hopefully you can go back there again someday and see the works for yourself!
hi loved the article and all the great photos!!