Gajah Museum : A slice of Indonesian culture

In my earlier post about Jakarta, I had mentioned about the National Museum of Indonesia. The building which houses this museum is called as Gedung Gajah because of an elephant statue in the front courtyard of the building. Hence it is often called as Gajah Museum as well. Gajah (गजः) is elephant in Sanskrit.

It is one of the most complete museums I have ever visited with everything about country’s history, art, culture, heritage, music, sociology, anthropology, architecture, etc. Museum is located very close to the Merdeka Square, which houses the Monas. This is central part of the city with most of the ministries and even the President’s House nearby.

The museum collection is said to be among the richest, the most complete and the best of its kind in Indonesia and also perhaps one of the finest in Indonesia. Museum has two wings- Gedung Gajah and the Gedung Arca. It has a very rich and large collection of Hindu-Buddhist art of ancient Indonesia. Museum has two floors. Second floor has a treasure room with artifacts made in gold and precious items. Even some statues of historic value have been kept there.

All the images in this post are from the ground floor sections only as photography is strictly prohibited on the second floor. (Click on the images for full caption)

The Asmat Canoe. Canoes used by Asmat tribes of Papua.

Madurese woodcarving

Wooden puppets of West Java. The purwa golek puppet theatre of West Java used to play stories of hindu epics Ramayana and Mahabharata. Here we can see the puppets depicting the five Pandavas.

Wooden puppets used in Mahabharata. These ones are of other fringe characters such as Ghatotkacha, Lakshmana, etc.

Wayang puppets of Java are made of leather and often used for kulit (shadow puppetry). These are all hindu mythological figures.

Banten Gamelan is an gamelan orchestra of the Javanese origin comprising of different traditional musical instruments. This instrument has its own unique musical sound.

Kotak boxes from Sumatra region are used to keep clothes or jewellery or to give dowry gifts

Traditional jewellers of Asmats

The Ancestor statue of Tanimbar. Tanimbar has distinct art of Wood carving.

This museum has a different section to showcase the types of houses traditionally built in various parts of the country.

Below is a traditional house of Minangkabau people called as gadang. This used o be a large house inhabited by several families.

The stone sculpture section as a rich collection of Hindu=Buddhist sculptures, relics and inscriptions collected from Java, Bali, Sumatra and Borneo. (Click on the images for full caption)

Bronze statues of different Hindu Gods

A beautiful bronze statue of Kuber, the god of wealth, symbolised by its huge belly.

A statue of Yakshini, offering water to drink.

Statue of Parwati, Shiva’s consort. This one was excavated from Timur region of East Java.

Big sculpture of Nandi in the central courtyard

A beautiful sculpture of Ganesha. Even this sculpture has skulls on its base, quite untypical of Ganesha statues in India.

A sculpture of Kal Bhairav

One of the grandest statue in the museum is this four metre tall Bhairav Buddha – a combined embodiment of Buddha as well as Bhairav. This is said to be the statue of King Adityavarman, a great Sumatran king.

This museum is truly very big and interesting. You need a lot of time to see and understand the different sections. Even a whole day would be not enough to do the justice.