Exhibition on museums staged to attrack locals

JAKARTA (JP): With over 60 museums dotted across the capital, Jakarta could be described as a city of museums. But whether residents have any interest in visiting these historical landmarks is another question.

Out of the seven museums under the care of the city's Museum and Renovation Agency, there was a mere trickle of about 50 visitors per day last year.

Surprisingly the total number of 120,000 visitors last year to the seven museums -- the Jakarta History Museum, Joang '45 Museum, Prasasti Museum, Bahari Museum, Arts and Ceramics Museum, Wayang Museum and Textile Museum -- was actually a jump compared to the 80,000 visitors in 1999.

Concern over local interest in our own historical landmarks is compounded by figures which further show that about 60 percent of these visitors were foreigners.

Local visitors comprised mostly students on school field trips.

The agency's head, Robert Silalahi, claimed that the environs of the venue, not the condition of the museums or the collections themselves, was a discouraging factor which explained why so few people bothered to visit museums.

In several locations people would not even realize that they were passing a museum as the front entrance was crowded by street vendors and stalls and the streets congested with heavy traffic.

"That's why people don't feel like visiting museums, instead, they prefer to go to malls," he told The Jakarta Post.

Several attempts to clean up the streets directly in front of the museums have been in vain as vendors were uncooperative, Robert said. The agency has appealed to the mayoralty to help with the problem.

According to Robert, another factor is that many are still unaware of the importance of visiting museums and assume they are "dull places to store ancient stuff".

Apart from managing the museum displays, the agency is currently launching a city-wide campaign to promote the seven museums under their care and to raise awareness among Jakartans of the need to appreciate their heritage.

To attract more visitors the agency began on Friday a series of museum promotional displays in the most unlikely of places -- shopping malls.

The first six-day exhibition was at the Atrium Plaza in Central Jakarta. This will be followed by Ratu Plaza in Central Jakarta from Sept. 22 to Sept. 27 and then the Park Plaza Hotel in West Jakarta from Oct. 3 to Oct. 8.

Photographs of the museums will be displayed along with periodic demonstrations of batik drawing, wayang (puppet) making and stone carving.

Robert hoped the move to promote museums in shopping malls and hotels could be a breakthrough in attracting visitors' attention to museums, particularly the young.

The drive to attract visitors to museums is as much a necessity for their survival as it is for education.

The city spends close to Rp 2 billion a year to maintain these seven museums.

The other museums in the capital are either privately owned or managed by the Ministry of National Education, such as the National Museum in Central Jakarta.(04)