TIME.CO, Jakarta – Acting Head (Plt.) of the Museums and Cultural Heritage Public Services Agency (BLU MCB) Ahmad Mahendra said that the special team for handling units National Museum Indonesia identified 589 of 817 collections affected by the disaster fire. The identification process was conducted for two weeks with great care.
“Even today, the process of evacuation and identification continues in the collection halls of ceramics, terracotta and civilization,” said Mahendra, quoted by the Ministry of Education and Culture website, Tuesday, October 10, 2023.
In making the identification, the team was assisted by experts from the Borodbur Conservation Center Team and the Cultural Preservation Center for Region VIII, Banten Province and DKI Jakarta. The identification activity also included the clearing of collections crushed by the walls of the MNI cultural heritage building which collapsed due to a fire.
“Currently, the evacuation team is still examining the collection,” Mahendra said.
The fire that occurred at the National Museum, also known as the Elephant Museum, occurred on Saturday 16 September. The fire destroyed at least six rooms of building A and affected hundreds of historical collections stored there.
Mahendra said further management of the remaining affected rooms, namely the Indonesian Cultural Hall, will be handled after the police completes the investigation and MNI receives permission for the evacuation and identification process. “At the same time as the ongoing evacuation and identification process, the classification process began from Monday 2 October 2023. “We are aiming for the damage level classification process for each affected collection to be completed as early as this month,” he said.
Announcement
The classification process itself will be divided into three categories, namely lightly, moderately and heavily affected collections. Once the collection rescue phase is executed, the MNI Special Units Management Team will enter the analysis phase to determine recommendations for appropriate management or repair and/or restoration processes for each affected collection.
This series of processes requires precision and therefore requires rather long times. For this reason, during this process, MNI is closed to the public.
However, according to Mahendra, BLU MCB is currently planning several series of programs so that the public can still access the MNI collection. “This is important so that the use of knowledge can continue,” she said.
Mahendra said his party wants to continue providing optimal educational facilities to the public. “This will of course coincide with our efforts to continue to provide the public with the latest information regarding the MNI recovery process in an open and regular manner,” she said.
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