Photo source: Museum Wayang (Instagram)
Although the puppetry is firstly an uptake culture, but now wayang (Javanese puppet) is being an original Indonesian culture with its various stories. This is also the reason why the Wayang Museum was built.
Photo source: Museum Wayang (Instagram)
1. History
Previously, the building of Wayang Museum was a church-owned by VOC (Vereenigde Oost-Indische Compagnie) in 1602. VOC also had known as The Government of Dutch East Indies. But because of a strong earthquake, the building collapsed and then the remaining land was built into a warehouse owned by Geo Wehry & Co. The Government of Dutch East Indies then reached agreement with Geo Wehry & Co on August 14th 1936 to make the building and the land into a monument. And then this building then bought by Bataviaasch Genootschap van Kunsten en Wetenschappen for the purpose of promoting researches on art and science, especially biology, physics, archeology, literature, ethnology, and history. In 1937, this building was then brought onto Stichting oud Batavia and then built as a museum with the name De Oude Bataviasche Museum or Batavia Lama Museum, which was opened by the last General Governor of Dutch East Indies, Tjarda van Starkenborgh Stachouwer. After the freedom of Indonesia, this building was then used as Djakarta Lama Museum. Until August 13th 1975, the Wayang Museum then built based on the proposal of DKI Jakarta’s Governor, Ali Sadikin, who inspired by the event of Pekan Wayang in 1974.
Photo source: Museum Wayang (Instagram)
2. Collections
The collections in Wayang Museum reach over 4.000 objects which divided in three categories, such as wayang, mask, and equipment. The wayang itself is divided again in four, such as wayang kulit, golek, klitik, and mainan. The mask is also divided by the origins, such as Bali, Cirebon, Jogja, Malang, and Surakarta. On the other side, the equipment category is the objects used to serenade the wayang show, such as gamelan and the other Javanese music instrument.
Photo source: Museum Wayang (Instagram)
3. Activity
There are lots of activities in the Wayang Museum. Besides a tour to look around the collections from Indonesia and some foreign countries such as Europe, Thailand, Suriname, China, Vietnam, India, and Colombia, you also can enjoy the wayang show every month. There will be Wayang Golek on the second week, Wayang Kulit Betawi on the third week, and Wayang Kulit Purwa on the fourth week. The guest can also learn how to make a wayang and how to be a Dalang (the wayang puppeteer). So interesting!