Changi Murals

The Changi Murals are a set of five paintings of biblical themes painted by Stanley Warren, a British bombardier and prisoner-of-war (POW) interned at the Changi Prison, during the Japanese occupation of Singapore in the Second World War. His murals were completed under difficult conditions of sickness, limited materials and hardships. With a message of universal love and forgiveness, they helped to uplift the spirits of the POWs and the sick when they sought refuge in the prison chapel.

After the war, the walls of the chapel were distempered over, hiding the murals from view. They were forgotten until their rediscovery in 1958. Due to their historical significance, an international search was conducted to locate the original painter to help in restoring the damaged and faded murals. Warren was eventually found in 1959 and, after much persuasion, agreed to assist in the restoration project. He made three trips to Singapore between 1963 and 1988 to restore his former paintings. Because of his advanced age, only four of the original murals were fully restored. In the 1990s, the former site of the murals was gazetted as a Heritage Site by the National Heritage Board of Singapore.^[1]