Seven city museums receive face-lift

Seven city museums receive face-lift

JAKARTA (JP): The city administration is currently beautifying
all of its seven museums in a bid to attract more Jakartans to
visit them, a city official said on Friday.

Head of the city Museum and Restoration Agency Robert Silalahi
said the beautification of the museums is expected to be
completed by the end of 2001.

"The project includes cleaning and renovating the damaged
parts of the buildings," he told reporters at the City Hall.

According to Robert, the works were badly needed since museums
have not, up until now, been very popular in the eyes of many
Jakartans.

Work at two of the buildings included in the beautification
project has so far been accomplished, at the Jakarta History
Museum (previously called Fatahillah Museum) and the nearby Art
and Ceramic Museum, both located in the old city of Kota in West
Jakarta. They cost some Rp 2.2 billion and Rp 1.5 billion
respectively.

In cooperation with the integrated textile company Texmaco,
the agency is constructing a new building along side the Textile
Museum building in Tanah Abang, Central Jakarta.

The work, he said, is to cost some Rp 1 billion.

The adjacent building is designed to host activities related
to the textile industry, such as fashion shows or exhibitions.

"At present, activities like fashion shows are only held at
hotels, restaurants or similar kinds of buildings.

I hope in the future all activities related to the textile
industry will be held in the museum complex so that it will be
visited by many people," Robert said.

Jakarta is the home of 60 museums, seven of which belong to
the administration, including the Wayang museum, the Naval museum
and the National Awakening museum.

The 53 others are run by either government or private
institutions.

Robert said he was thinking of uniting all elements in the
community here who were concerned about the museums and their
collections, hoping that they could then establish a strong
collective group or foundation.

"It's the foundation which will later finance the museums'
activities," he said.

In a related development, Robert also said that the agency was
sounding out the possibility of cooperating with foreign
countries, either with governments or non governmental
organizations, to save national heritage sites at four islands
belonging to Pulau Seribu (Thousand Islands) group in North
Jakarta.

The sites, in the form of fortresses built by the Dutch
colonial government, are scattered on Onrust, Bidadari, Kahyangan
and Kelor islands and are under serious threat of damage and
decay, he said.

He said sea erosion and sand-digging had damaged the
fortresses and reduce the widths of the islands.

"For example, the size of Onrust island is now only 7.5
hectares, from 12 hectares previously," he said.

"So far, there has been a green light from the Dutch
government and organizations to help finance works at the
islands," he said. (ind)