Sabah Art Gallery — Attraction in Sabah

The art itself is beautiful. However, Jennifer P Linggi, who is the curator, disappointingly showed quite an astounding lack of professionalism when we tried to buy some of the artworks. It took a fortnight to finalise the transaction. We had to make 4 seperate trips to the gallery. Jennifer was consistently poor in replying to messages, and even when she did, she did not answer all the questions. At one point we asked where we could buy poster tubes to put the artwork in to transport home and she sent us to a shop that did not sell any. On our third trip to the gallery, we tried to pick up the pieces but found that the paper used to separate them and protect the charcoal from smudging and been cut and placed in strips which left parts of the art work exposed. When we asked for new paper that fully covered the artwork to be put on it, we were told it would take 20-25 minutes. At this point we asked for a discount for our time and inconvenience. Jennifer did not bother responding to this, and left for the countryside the next day when we went back to pick them up. She again delayed replying. When we suggested the whole conduct of the transaction had not been at an acceptable standard, we were told that they had already gone above and beyond because they had taken the art work out of their frames (but did not discount the price for the frames) and we had asked for a quote from Sabah post and they unnecessarily took the artwork to the post office to have it weighed. We decided to go ahead with the transaction at that point purely because of the art’s beauty. We were then told (on our FOURTH trip) that the art gallery had no facilities to take payment by card and we had to go an ATM to make the payment in cash. Given that this was the Sabah Art Gallery, this was an incredibly disappointing experience, particularly given the gallery was meant to be competently representing the artists and facilitating the sale of their work. I would strongly recommend not to have any dealings...

Sabah Art Gallery, a small art museum where mainly local artists can exhibit their work

• Closed on Mondays

• Open Tuesday - Sunday, 9am - 4pm

• Entry fee: 15 RM (adults foreigners), 5 RM (adults, locals)

• Location: a bit outside the town, walkable or take a Grab / Maxim

• Recommended time to visit: 30 min

• I love art but this museum is very tiny and doesn't justify the entrance fee. There are two floors where the exhibitions are located and you can see the entire floor and artefacts standing in one place, as the floor is a circle with the stairs in the middle. This reel has like half of the things you can see ..

• There are free sculptures outside which probably are equal to the number of the ones inside. Better to focus on those ones and save your money.

• There is no water dispenser, no toilet paper, soap is mixed with water. Very disappointing conditions especially for the price asked. I talked to the staff and told them my opinion in person, I even filled a feedback form. Maybe the management will rethink the tourist price as it's not justified, not even close.

• Can be easily skipped if not an avid art loved

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I enjoyed my experience here, but I think having low expectations in advance is key. There are only two very small floors that are sparse. The signs are not in English, so the first floor on the life and career of Sabah’s state designer is fairly incoherent. At the time I visited, the second floor was an exhibit of geometric art, much of which looked similar.

Some workers were bringing some art out of storage at the time I left, and I enjoyed briefly glimpsing those interesting pieces more than what I saw displayed in the museum.

I think this museum is worth a visit and the entrance fee for foreigners is not a lot of money all things considered. I recommend going to the Taman Rimba tropical park nearby for a stroll and a fresh coconut before or after to make the trip to the museum more justifiable.

As for the museum as an institution, I question why the entrance fee is triple the price for foreigners when you don’t even have English signs, so we can’t really...