Museum Nusantara

Investigation results

None of the objects in this museum have problematic provenance.

Result of this investigation

The museum is based around a nineteenth-century training institute for the colonial civil service: Indische Instelling. The museum has records of the provenance of most of its collection: civil servants and graduates of the institute used to send items from the East Indies to give students an idea of where they would be working. These were often utensils and examples of applied art for use as teaching materials in class. Since Indische Instelling’s closure in 1901, the collection has continued to expand with gifts from individuals and collectors. Investigators have not examined these gifts. The museum and Delft municipality and various external parties are currently reconsidering the collection’s future. It is as yet difficult to determine what the short and long term consequences will be, which leaves the future of the provenance investigation uncertain.

About this museum and its collection

Since it opened in 1911, the museum has shown a collection of ethnographic objects that were used as teaching aids to prepare civil servants for their career in the Dutch East Indies. The collection of weapons, textiles, copper, wajang puppets and jewellery reflects the fine and applied art of the archipelago’s cultures. Museum Nusantara closed in January 2013.