EXHIBITION: 'THE LINE: BEYOND THE FOREST'S EDGE'
Venue: Bank Negara Malaysia Museum and Art Gallery (BNM MAG), KL
Date: ends April 4, 2027
Photography has rarely been given much space in major exhibitions in Kuala Lumpur, so The Line: Beyond The Forest’s Edge is a welcome change.
This exhibition at Bank Negara Malaysia Museum and Art Gallery features award-winning photographer Ian Teh’s acclaimed The Line series, which won the Sagamihara Photography Asia Award this year.
His photographs look at Greater Kuala Lumpur through the shifting boundary between the city and the forests around it – documenting not just how the landscape looks, but how the two are increasingly connected.
The exhibition brings together 51 photographs, an audio piece and a video documentary shown in an immersive dark room.
A 360° virtual reality experience takes visitors further into the landscape, offering another way to explore what lies beyond the forest’s edge.
Nature enthusiasts, curious gallery hoppers and content creators can all take a leisurely stroll through the exhibition, exploring Teh’s striking views of Greater KL and the changing landscape where the city meets the forest.
Free admission exhibition.
More info here.
EXHIBITION: 'BOTANY OF BELONGING: FORESTS OF SOUTH-EAST ASIA'
Venue: Forest Learning Centre, Perdana Botanical Gardens, KL
Date: ends November 20 (Fridays to Sundays)
For an informative and inspiring weekend outing, head to the Forest Learning Centre at Perdana Botanical Gardens in KL for Botany Of Belonging, a botanical art exhibition celebrating the beauty of South-East Asian forests.
The exhibition features detailed botanical illustrations (prints) by 45 artists from Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, Vietnam, the Philippines, Thailand, Brunei and Japan. Blending art and science, the works offer a closer look at forest plants and their intricate details.
Visitors can also explore the tools and techniques artists use to capture plant anatomy and colour. Once an important way to document and study forest flora, botanical illustration demands artistic skill, scientific knowledge and patience.
Even with today’s cameras and macro lenses, these hand-drawn works offer a more personal connection to nature and a rare chance to appreciate the craft up close.
Workshops, journalling tours and other activities are held throughout the exhibition. Free admission. Open Fridays to Sundays, 10am–4pm.
More info here.
CULTURAL ARTS: PUSAKA AT KL SENI & STEM FEST
Venue: KLCC Esplanade, Kuala Lumpur
Date: Oct 2-4
For the Kuala Lumpur Seni & STEM Festival 2026, Pusaka presents a three-day showcase of Malaysia’s performing arts heritage at KLCC Esplanade, starting this evening.
The pop-up programme daily features Cantonese Opera by Yuetwan Cantonese Opera Association KL, Urumee Melum (traditional drumming) by Chinna Rasa Urumee Melum Masana Kali, Boria by Kumpulan Boria Omara and Seni Reog by Kumpulan Sri Wahyuni.
Organised by Petrosains and Dewan Filharmonik PETRONAS, the festival brings together art, heritage and innovation, giving audiences a chance to experience traditional art forms in the heart of the city.
Pusaka is a Unesco-accredited Malaysian organisation dedicated to safeguarding and revitalising traditional performing arts and intangible cultural heritage.
The performances are Cantonese Opera, Friday at 6.30pm; Urumee Melum, Saturday at 3pm; Boria, Saturday at 5.30pm; Seni Reog, Saturday at 8.30pm; and Seni Reog, Sunday at 5pm.
Free admission events.
More info here.
CONCERT: ANOUSHKA SHANKAR - 'CHAPTERS' TOUR
Venue: Plenary Hall, KL Convention Centre
Date: Oct 4, 8pm
Discerning music fans in Kuala Lumpur have a chance to catch one of the world’s most celebrated sitar players when British-American musician and composer Anoushka Shankar brings her Asian tour to the capital on Oct 4.
The daughter of legendary sitar maestro Ravi Shankar, Anoushka plays the Plenary Hall at the KL Convention Centre this Sunday following glowing reviews for the tour’s opening stop in Singapore recently.
The tour setlist centres on Chapters, her deeply personal trilogy of albums: Chapter I: Forever, For Now (2023), Chapter II: How Dark It Is Before Dawn (2024) and Chapter III: We Return To Light (2026).
Her Hindustani classical roots, blended with contemporary and global influences, give her music a broad appeal. The tour also marks her 30th year on stage.
At 45, Anoushka continues to expand the possibilities of the sitar while carving out her own musical identity. Some may also remember her early KL appearance with Ravi at a charity concert in February 2001.
She recently collaborated with Damon Albarn’s Gorillaz on The Mountain. With her trilogy completed, three decades on stage and a rich musical legacy behind her, there is much to look forward to at this concert.
More info here.
THEATRE: THE RELATIONS**T CHRONICLES - KL EDITION
Venue: Indicine, KLPac
Date: Oct 2-4
Presented by Penang-based Big Nose Productions, known for Shakespeare Goes Bollywood, Tales From The Bedroom and other productions in its Tales series, this show is created by award-winning playwright Fa Abdul and writer-director Karam Tabba.
The Relations**t Chronicles brings together 10 performers and nine solo stories about love, relationships and everything in between.
Setting the tone is the show’s blurb: “A stand-up-style comedy about every relationship that’s ever gone gloriously, hilariously wrong.”
Following a successful Penang run last year, the Kuala Lumpur edition features an all-new cast and fresh stories. Over 90 minutes, the performers offer honest, often funny takes on the moments that can make or break a relationship.
The nine stories include Small Boat, Big Waves by Desmond Ngooi, Aww, He Really Loves Me by Andi Zephyr, Caution: May Cause Sudden Loss In Interest by Jesidhn Pillai, I Hate Indian Men by Deena Dakshini, The Makeover Marriage by Zee Rezuriff, Chivalry’s Last Breath by Hazim Mansur and Violacea Low, Happy Disease by Jech Wong, Out Of Your League by Swarna Naidu and Table For One by Naveen Raja.
Those looking for a glimpse of homegrown theatre with a raw, unfiltered voice will find plenty to savour here. Recommended for mature audiences.
More info here.
THEATRE: 'RASHOMON'
Venue: DPAC, Petaling Jaya
Date: Oct 2-4
Inspired by Japanese literary great Ryunosuke Akutagawa’s Yabu no Naka (In A Grove, 1922), this Mandarin theatre adaptation titled Rashomon at DPAC follows a samurai, his wife and the bandit Tajomaru in a bamboo forest.
The wife is later found dead, but the accounts of what happened — including one given by the samurai’s spirit through a shrine maiden — do not match.
Like a puzzle, the play takes audiences on a search for the truth.
Directed and adapted by Yves Yap, the Fay Theatre production stars Jacky Chea, Won Jun Yap, Chen Yu Huan, Joven Leong, Benjamin Heng, Lennard Oung and Koek Peik Yong.
Running this weekend at the experimental space Black Box, DPAC, the 80-minute production has no intermission and uses a minimalist production style, keeping the focus on the actors, story and shifting accounts.
Rashomon also contains mature themes and content.
More info here.
EXHIBITION: SHARON CHIN'S 'MISSING FROM THE SCENE'
Venue: The Back Room, Zhongshan building, KL
Date: ends Nov 1
Contemporary artist Sharon Chin, now based in Negri Sembilan, returns to the Kuala Lumpur gallery scene with Missing From The Scene, her first solo exhibition in the capital since 2019 (Sharon Chin: Ingin Jadi Pelukis Drawings 2013 - 2018 was held at Hom Art Trans gallery in Feb 2019).
Curated by Eric Goh, the new exhibition explores different forms of absence – from Chin’s move away from KL and changes in Malaysia’s art scene to habitat loss and disappearing biodiversity.
The exhibition brings together wayang kulit-inspired animal puppets, collagraph and linocut prints, alongside a live feed of an oil refinery flare stack visible from her home in Port Dickson. Chin moved to the coastal town in Negri Sembilan in 2011, where she has held occasional pop-up exhibitions there.
The show’s lengthy run at The Back Room will be punctuated by artist talks, informal tours and forum discussions. It is accompanied by a zine publication, featuring essays by Eric Goh, Azzad Diah, and Nau Suter; and a questionnaire, asking audiences: “What is missing from your scene?”
More info here.
