Celebrating tangible and non-tangible heritage
Keeping up with the celebration of World Heritage Day, Museum of Christian Art, Old Goa, will organise the first ever Holy Hill Heritage Festival 2023 on April 22 and 23 with a special focus on art, food and cultural heritage of Goa
Dolcy D’Cruz
What’s not to love about celebrating Goa’s heritage? Goa boasts of great art, music and a festival to celebrate this is always welcome. Museum of Christian Art, Old Goa in collaboration with GHAG and INTACH Goa Chapter will organise the first ever Holy Hill Heritage Festival 2023 on April 22 and 23 from 9 am to 5 pm. This is the first ever Holy Hill Festival that was imagined a few years before the pandemic. After the installation of the upgraded museum in 2022, MoCA decided to bring out community focused programmes that can contribute in creating awareness about Goa’s heritage.
“The Holy Hill Heritage Festival 2023 is open to all and there is much more to look forward to. There will be talks, walks and art workshops. It is important that we embrace heritage and we have also invited students from different colleges to be attend the festival. It can be beneficial to students who are studying history and subjects related to culture. MoCA is a space where one doesn’t access to throughout the year and through the interactive walks, it is a good opportunity to explore the museum and other monuments,” says Natasha Fernandes, curator of the Museum of Christian Art since 2007.
“We have been working on the concept of this festival with the entire team for a year now. The motto of the museum is to promote art, culture and heritage in the community. As World Heritage Day was celebrated on April 18, we thought of organising the weekend celebrating not just the tangible heritage like the monuments but also the non-tangible heritage which includes Goan art, food and music which is part of our identity. Even when we talk about Goan food, there is much more than just fish, curry and rice. There are many food items that are linked to religious festivals in Goa. Through the Heritage Hour, Dr Maria Lourdes Bravo da Costa Rodrigues will focus on ‘Feasts and Festivals: the Food Connection’,” says Prithi Carvalho, curatorial associate at the Museum of Christian Art, Old Goa.
Speaking about the other workshops, Prithi adds, “There will be a traditional musical performance based on the percussion instruments that are played in Goa and Sameer Kapadi will throw light on instruments like the ghumott, mandale etc. There will be two film screening over the two day festival. Film Screening that highlight two main ingredients of Goan life, bread through Sonia Filinto’s ‘Bread and Belonging’ and rice through Vince Costa’s ‘Saxtticho Koddo.’ The pop-up market will bring back the charm of the Purument with food items like salt, chillies, pickles, solla, binda and tamarind.”
