Kaduna Museum returns with 8000 year artefact
New life is breeding at the National Museum in Kaduna as there is work presently going on in the facility where workers are seen busy unpacking artifacts the museum received from Germany and fixing the gallery up for its grand opening sometime this year.
The museum used to be a beehive of activities, attracting visitors from far and near, including foreigners until it was partially closed for renovation work in 2013.
Established in 1975, the mesuem located opposite the Emir of Zazzau’s palace along Ali Akilu Road in Kaduna, is one of the many historical monuments the city inherited for being the capital of the defunct Northern Region.
Daily Trust on Sunday gathered that the museum had witnessed some remarkable improvements in the last few years. Now, the old dilapidated building has been pulled down and a new one is being built, but progress of work is slow.
The museum was initially made of mud blocks, portraying the ancient northern Nigeria like the residence of the late Sardauna of Sokoto, Sir Ahmadu Bello, in Kaduna. It was later rebuilt with cement blocks as the structure was getting dilapidated. However, the artisanal shops making the building’s façade are still the same structures of 40 years ago.
Some of the oldest artifacts that were on display at the museum before the renovation came from the six geopolitical. They included the Nok culture or Terracotta, the Igbo-Ukwu culture, the classical Ife sculptures and the Benin court arts, representing the pre-historic section.
Now with the reopening of the museum it will be showcasing terracotta on Nok and try to juxtapose the Nok culture with the other cultures in Nigeria like the Iboko, Ife, Benin, Owo, Tada.
The exhibition our correspondent gathered will be titled ‘Nok within the context of Nigerian Arts Traditions’ in order to showcase the place of Nok in the cultural melee of Nigeria, how the Nok people influenced the art of other cultures of Nigeria and how the arts of other cultural areas of Nigeria influenced that of the Nok.
Speaking on why the museum had been closed for years, the Director for Museums, National Commission for Museums and Abuja, Issa Odey said, “We wanted to put up an exhibition on Nok culture and the terracotta that have been collected from different excavations from research work that has been going on for over two decades.
“We wanted to have them here for exhibition and at the end of the exhibition at the University of Canfield in Germany the objects where returned together with their show cases. Unfortunately, only the objects came first of all and then the show cases where to arrive but due to some government policy of not giving wavers for anything that has to do with furniture, we were not able to get those show cases back.
“We had no choice than to look for other means of having those objects exhibited. At the moment, we are doing the construction of the show cases and stands so that the galleries can again be opened to the public.”
He added, “The exhibition will go into Kaduna in retrospect, that is, taking a look at the cultures in Kaduna State, their religion, their arts and crafts, their royalty, their musical instruments, all that will be exhibited in different sections of the gallery, it is going to be a two in one exhibition.”
He noted that “The essence of museum exhibitions is to showcase the culture and the civilization of the people and especially for the audiences which comprise of schools which will give them information about Nigeria and Nigerians, different cultures of the people, the different levels of civilization that we have attained, the past arts and crafts of our people and how the people of today will be able to utilize the ideas that people had in the past and improve upon out technology.
“The essence is not just to entertain people but to give them scholarly information that will enable them to utilize and improve on our technology and science.”
Commenting on how old the object are, he said, “There are objects that date up to 2500 years ago and we are going to display in pictorial form the Dufuna canoe which is the oldest water craft in Africa which dates back to about 8,000 years ago. That particular object is going to be exhibited in Damaturu, Yobe State but the photograph of it will be displayed here.
“The objects that will be on display shows that we have a long history of civilization even before the Europeans and Americans knew about civilization, our people had been well civilized because they were settled and organised politically before those people. The world is normally amazed when they see our arts and crafts.”