- National Palace Museum.
VIVA – The National Taiwan Palace Museum claims to have cracked three artefacts of Ming and Qing dynasties worth US$77 million or IDR 1.2 trillion.
The Guardian on November 1, 2022, reported that broken items such as a bowl, a teacup, and a plate were uninsured. These ceramics were damaged in three separate incidents in the last eighteen months. But the damage was only revealed last week.
On October 28, 2022, Taiwan’s opposition legislator, Chen I-shin, claimed to have received a lead, accusing the museum director of trying to cover up the incident and ordered staff not to talk about the damages.
Cangkir teh kuning dengan dua naga hijau Dinasti Ming.
- Museum Istana Nasional Taiwan.
The Museum and museum’s director Wu Mi-cha admitted that three artifacts in its archives were broken. But they denied allegations that they had tried to cover up the incident.
In Press conferences on February 3, 2021, and April 7, 2022, Wu Mi-cha said when staff members arranged the artifacts, they found that the "yellow teacup with two green dragons" was Ming dynasty (1368-1644) and the Qing dynasty " dragon-patterned yellow teacup” (dated 1636–1911) was damaged.
Additionally, on May 19 this year, a Qing dynasty “blue-and-white floral plate” fell and broke due to staff mishandling, Taiwan News reported.
Piring bunga biru-putih dari dinasti Qing.
- Museum Istana Nasional Taiwan.
Wu said a senior staff member had placed the plate on a 1m-high workstation and it fell onto a carpeted floor and broke into several pieces “as a bowl would”.
The museum also said it was unable to determine who was responsible for the other two incidents despite going through 10 years of CCTV surveillance footage. Wu suspected the broken artifacts could be due to an unsatisfactory storage method.
He added that his staff immediately notified him of the incidents, and he had launched investigations in response.
The National Palace Museum on the outskirts of Taipei houses the world's largest collection of Chinese artifacts, most of which were brought from the mainland by Chiang Kai-shek after the Nationalists fled to Taiwan during the Chinese civil war.
The collection covers 5,000 years of Chinese history, with only a small portion displayed at any one time.
