Friendship promotes its work of cultural preservation at home and abroad through an on-going travelling exhibition. The boats on display are handcrafted maintaining every single feature and detail of each type of boat. The exhibitions also have materials traditionally transported by life-size boats. Jute, ropes, bamboos and clay pottery gives a sense of what the daily life on the boats are like. Films and descriptive panels complete the visual material. The purpose of these exhibitions is to raise national and international awareness on the impending loss of our ancient fleet.
After being hosted by the Bengal Gallery in Dhaka in 2004, the exhibition moved to the Bangladesh National Museum in 2005. The exhibition had been a great success, with the highlight being the day when we had almost 10,000 visitors, ranging from politicians, to rickshaw pullers to students and many more, all in one day.
Following this exhibition, an increase in the recognition of the work of Friendship took place and Runa Khan Marre, the Executive Director of Friendship, was accorded the Rolex Award on 26 November, 2006, for her work in promoting Bengali heritage and its conservation.
In addition to this recognition, awareness grew internationally and the exhibition was taken to France, where it was first hosted by the National Museum of the Marine in Paris in 2008. The Museum, as well as international specialists recognized the extraordinary quality of the model boats realized by our carpenters.
Starting from 2008, exhibitions were held in the Museum of the Marine in Brest in 2008 and the prestigious Salon Nautique, Paris in 2008 and 2009 and most recently in Dhaka in the Bangladesh National Museum in March 2010. Currently, the exhibition titled Voiles anciennes du Bangladesh is on-going at Le Port Musée de Douarnenez in Brittany, France and a two month long exhibition in the CCRN in Luxembourg started on 22 July 2010.
Exhibition on 'Traditional Boats of Bangladesh'
 |
 |
 |
 |
| Bengal Gallery |
Bangladesh National Museum | National Museum of the Marine |
Museum of the Marine |
| Dhaka, Bangladesh | Dhaka, Bangladesh | Paris, France | Brest, France |
| 2004 | 2005 | 2008 | 2008 |
 |
 |
 |
|
| Salon Nautique, Porte de Versailles | Le Port Musee, Douarnenez | Bangladesh National Museum | |
| Paris, France | Brittany, France | Dhaka, Bangladesh | |
| 2008-2009 | 2009-2010 | 2010 |
The exhibition 'Old Sails of Bangladesh'
| Due in particular to its dangerosity, caused by the strength of its stream and the versality of its rivers, the Delta of Bengal, the second most important of the planet, has during thousands of years remained in a situation of technical isolation, away from any foreign influence. As a result of this, it has hosted and conserved the largest inland fleet worldwide, characterisedby ancestral techniques which have disappeared since long from other parts of the world. But during the last twenty years, technical progress has caused this exceptional wooden fleet to disappear and presently only a very small number of specimens subsist. In order to preserve this heritage from going lost, the NGO Friendship promotes the creation, in Bangladesh, of a « Living Museum of the Traditional Boat » at the same time as it organises itinerating exhibitions of replicas each of which amounts to a sort of three dimensionalarchives and which are produced by the last remaining carpenters who are thereby enabled to preserve and to transmit their ancestral technical skills. The exhibition displayed at CCRN has previously been hosted by the Marine Museum of Paris ( Trocadéro ) and Brest, as well as by the National Museum in Dhaka. Presently it may also be visited at the Port Musée of Douarnenez ( Bretagne ). |
 |
The exhibition Old Sails of Bangladesh has been made possible thanks to the support of KMPG, AB Bank Bangladesh, Matanel Foundation, Compagnie de Banque Privée (CBP), Soludec SA, Foyer and some private donors.
Related Downloads:
Friendship Brcchure for Luxembourg Exhibition
Friendship Catalogue for Luxembourg Exhibition
'Voiles - anciennes du Bangladesh' - by Yves Marre
 |