National Archive building gets Unesco heritage award

Ida Indawati Khouw, Contributor, Jakarta

There's good news for building conservation efforts in Indonesia.

Despite the lack of attention given to the conservation of historical buildings here, the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization (Unesco) Asia-Pacific Heritage Award for Cultural Heritage Conservation has been awarded to Indonesia.

The 2001 Award of Excellence went to the closed Dutch-style Gedung Arsip Nasional RI (ANRI), or the National Archive Building on Jl. Gajah Mada 111 in West Jakarta, and the award was handed over on Jan. 27. The building won the award from among 15 other conserved buildings in the Asia-Pacific region, such as in Australia, China, Hong Kong, India, Singapore, Sri Lanka and the Philippines.

"The building's conservation has been successfully carried out despite political uncertainty," said Unesco's Regional Advisor for Culture in Asia and the Pacific Richard A. Engelhardt while presenting the award.

The award was conferred in the courtyard of the 3,300-square- meter ANRI building complex, which consists of a two-story main building, two pavilions at the north and south wings and a U- shaped building at the west section.

The award is like a reward for the serious and detailed work of collaborative experts involving architects Han Awal and Budi Lim from Indonesia, and Cor Passchier, an experienced Dutch conservationist. Together, they successfully transformed the "cancer-ridden construction" into a beautiful museum and multifunctional building.

Built in 1760 in the wealthy suburb of Molenvliet, now a busy business district, the building was earlier called de Klerk house -- after its first owner Reynier de Klerk (1710-1980), a governor general during the era of the Dutch trading company VOC (Vereenigde Oost-Indische Compagnie) that ruled the Dutch East Indies (which later became Indonesia) between 1619 and 1799.

Restoration work on the building, the only remaining Dutch country house still existing in the area, took place between 1995 and 1998 under the initiative of Dutch individuals here as a special gift for Indonesia's 50th anniversary.

Han, who heads the conservators, said the work began with detailed surveys of the building's history and construction techniques. Experts from the Ministry of Education and Culture collaborated to investigate and advise on the choice of materials to replace old parts.

"The idea was to restore the building to its original style based on the oldest photograph taken in the 1920s that was found at the Tropical Institute in Amsterdam," said the senior architect.

The mansion underwent many changes resulting from the changes in ownership after the death of de Klerk in 1780. Once, it became an orphanage, then the mining department of the Dutch colonial government office. In 1925 it was restored and converted for use as an archive building.

When the Indonesian government took over the building after independence, its function as an archive to preserve the country's public records and documents of historical interest was continued and enlarged until 1980s when the archive building moved to South Jakarta.

Since then the building was left vacant and it further deteriorated, especially during rainy season where the whole back garden and auxiliary buildings were flooded since most of the site is lower than ground level.

"The walls were damp, the plaster and paint were peeling off while the woodwork was infested with white ants. It had become 'a cancer-ridden building'," said Han.

Then research was conducted from old photographs and plans from the Tropical Institute to determine which parts belonged to the original building and should stay, and which ones should be removed.

Laboratory tests on the building's old components also played a great role in determining, for instance, the paint type and color, the wall's plaster and other materials.

"After the tests we concluded the most suitable paint for the archive building was a water proof kind which is not common in Indonesia. The special paint known as vat was then imported from the Netherlands," Budi Lim said in his paper titled Restorasi Gedung ANRI (the Restoration of ANRI Building).

The windows and doors were then painted in an ox blood color while the beautiful baroque carvings were painted in gold.

Similar treatment was also given to other materials like the roof tiles, floors and the ceramic wall tiles.

"We reinstalled the old materials or replaced them with those taken from other ruined old buildings from the same era. In some instances we also used replicas," said Budi, who now runs his own business in Singapore.

Dutch glass expert Gerrit Bolwerk even spent weeks experimenting when reinstalling old window glass.

"The surface of the window glass was not flat and we wanted to have them that way as that is the beauty of old buildings," Han said.