KUALA LUMPUR – A child’s drawing usually belongs to a small world: a sheet of paper, a classroom wall or a refrigerator door. Over the Merdeka weekend, drawings by Malaysian students moved far beyond those familiar spaces and became part of the city.
From 8pm to midnight on Aug. 30 and 31, artworks from a national student competition were projected across the 137-metre facade of Bangunan Sultan Abdul Samad as part of Pesta Lampu Sedunia Malaysia, also known as Light-Up KL. Projection mapping turned the landmark into a field of colour and movement, while a drone display extended the experience above Dataran Merdeka.
The installation appeared within the wider Festival Ambang Merdeka 2026, the three-day celebration held at Dataran Merdeka from Aug. 29 to 31 for Malaysia’s 69th National Day. Bernama reported that more than 100,000 people gathered at the square on Merdeka Eve alone.
From a Sheet of Paper to the Skyline
The competition, Draw Your Own Malaysia, invited students from kindergarten through university to interpret the theme Cerita Kita – Truly Malaysia. Entrants worked on an official A4 template using traditional media such as crayon, coloured pencil, watercolour, ink, charcoal and tempera. Digital drawings and AI-generated artwork were not accepted.
Across three age categories, the competition offered 39 awards and a total prize pool of RM27,000. More importantly, the programme was designed to give every eligible artwork a place in the projection, allowing many individual interpretations of Malaysia to share the same national stage.
That decision gave the project an unusual starting point in a digital-first world. The source material remained deliberately human: individual marks, imperfections and choices made by the person holding the pencil. Technology entered later, giving each drawing a new scale without erasing its character.
A Historic Landmark, Reimagined
Projection mapping at this scale is not simply a matter of placing an image on a building. Every arch, window, tower and change in surface becomes part of the composition. Movement has to follow the architecture, while colour, contrast and fine detail must remain legible across a facade experienced from a distance.
Completed in 1897, Bangunan Sultan Abdul Samad entered a new chapter in 2026. Block 1 reopened to the public on Feb. 2 after an 11-month conservation and restoration programme led by Khazanah Nasional through Dana Warisan under the Warisan KL initiative. The restoration was intended not only to preserve the landmark, but also to reactivate it as an inclusive, living public space.
For two nights, that ambition became visible at monumental scale. The building remained a symbol of Malaysia’s past, while the students’ artworks brought the ideas of a younger generation into its architecture.
The People Behind the Transformation
Pesta Lampu Sedunia Malaysia was organised by FrameMotion Studio, Ultimate Evo and Light-Up KL, with DBKL and Warisan KL as strategic partners. Within that collaboration, FrameMotion’s work focused on translating individual student artworks into projection content capable of occupying the landmark while retaining the personality of the original drawings.
Established in 2008, FrameMotion began as a television commercial production house before expanding into projection mapping, immersive experiences, animation, interactive installations and digital storytelling. Founder and CEO Jeand Pua was named EY Technology Entrepreneur Of The Year 2024 Malaysia, and the studio’s work on Soloz: Game of Life received Best Visual Effects at the 34th Malaysia Film Festival.
“Technology is never the story by itself. Projection mapping, animation and drones are tools. What matters is what you use those tools to say, and how you make people feel. In this project, technology gave us a way to take something as simple as a child’s drawing and let an entire city experience it.”
– Jeand Pua, Founder and CEO, FrameMotion Studio
Making Scale Feel Human
The finished experience looked effortless. The production process was anything but. Each artwork had to be prepared, composed and animated before being integrated into a coherent large-scale sequence. The technical challenge was not merely to make the images larger, but to preserve their texture and emotional immediacy after they crossed into another medium.
For FrameMotion, the most important creative decision was to keep the students’ work at the centre of the experience rather than treating it as decoration around a technology showcase.
“We didn’t want the children’s drawings to simply become decoration within a light show. We wanted them to become the heart of it. These are the children who will inherit Malaysia, so giving their imagination a place on a landmark like Bangunan Sultan Abdul Samad felt incredibly meaningful to us.”
– Jeand Pua, Founder and CEO, FrameMotion Studio
A Picture of What Comes Next
Malaysia’s historic architecture provided the stage. The students provided the source material. Technology connected the two.
For a generation growing up among screens, algorithms and increasingly sophisticated image-making tools, the origin of the experience remained remarkably simple: someone sat down with a piece of paper and decided what Malaysia looked like to them.
For two nights, Malaysia’s past became a canvas for its future – and that future began with a drawing made by hand.
About FrameMotion Studio
FrameMotion Studio Sdn. Bhd. is an award-winning Malaysian creative technology studio established in 2008. It creates projection mapping, immersive experiences, interactive installations, animation and digital storytelling for cultural destinations, events and brands. More information is available at framemotionstudio.com
