Istiqlal Harmony Festival Showcases Development of Nusantara Islamic Culture

The largest mosque in Southeast Asia, Istiqlal Mosque opens a Harmoni Festival from December 10, 2024, to February 28, 2025, exhibiting the development of Islamic culture in the archipelago.

This event starts from spatial awareness because there is regional creation

Istiqlal Harmony Festival Initiator, Handoko Hendroyono explained the festival was realized in collaboration with Ministry of Religious, Ministry of Culture, Ministry of MSME, Istiqlal Mosque Management Agency, and Cipta Cultural Advancement Movement. It was divided into three exhibition rooms, namely Istiqlal and the region, Islam in the archipelago and the Imam Bukhari room.

"This event starts from spatial awareness because there is regional creation, where Istiqlal plays an important role as a big energy in the development of the Lapangan Banteng area," he expressed, Saturday (12/28).

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In the first room, he explained, there would be an exhibition of various sketches of historical buildings in the area around Lapangan Banteng such as Merdeka Palace Building, Immanuel Church, Department Building and Post Bloc complete with building literacy captions.

Then also a replica of the Istiqlal model and the surrounding area by Arya Angga Sinaga, the winner of the National Capital Design Competition.

According to him, the model design emphasized the importance of the sidewalk's role as a place for socializing and connecting the area with Istiqlal as the epicenter.

"The first room also displays old and contemporary photos of the beauty of the Istiqlal building," he added.

Then on the second room, there were various timelines of Islamic literacy development from its first entry and development in Indonesia, as well as various cultural products, arts and everyday equipment from the community resulting from acculturation.

He went on to say that the various things on display emphasized how the stages of Islam's entry and development in Indonesia were able to adapt and acculturate with culture, ethnicity and social levels of society. It is a characteristic of the development of Islam in Indonesia and has the potential to become the epicenter of world Islam.

This second room has various glass paintings from Cirebon with wayang motifs containing calligraphy, rofiah batik, religious comics, various poems, and ancient manuscripts from Penyengat Island.

"There is also a digital contemporary art exhibition area that is in line with Islamic values," he furthered.

While for the third room has various hadith literature of Imam Bukhari and immersive technology art. There is also a digital relaxation area that was directly imported from the Buchari Islamic Art Gallery, Uzbekistan.

"To enjoy them, every visitor only pay a ticket by Rp 35,000 to Rp 45,000," he added.

During the festival, he uttered, the average number of visitors per day reached around 1,300 people.

Besides providing education and entertainment, the festival was enlivened by a bazaar attended by more than 100 MSMEs with various products.

"This bazaar is in order to revive the economy," he concluded.

He admitted that in the future, his party would also involve participation from various other countries such as Qatar, Türkiye, Malaysia, and China.

"Hope this can be a reference and literacy of peaceful and tolerant Islam, and open the public's eyes to the space of imagination and expression. Next, Qatar is waiting to participate," he closed.