Museum of Fine Arts (MFA), Boston, the fourth largest museum in USA, hosted a special event on Odisha Arts & Culture for the first time in the USA during its Diwali event on 2nd November in partnership with The Odisha Society of the Americas (OSA). There were spectacular performances on Odissi Classical Dance and Sambalpuri Folk Dance by local artists of New England area, followed by video presentations on rich cultural heritage of Odisha, India. There was also a photo exhibition on Odisha temple architectures on Konark Temple, Sri Jagannath Temple, Sri Lingraj Temple; Buddhists monuments of Ratnagiri, Raghurajpur Pattachitra, Palm leaf engraving and painting, Odisha hand woven textiles (Gitagovinda Pheta), Cuttack Filigree work, Pipili Applique work, Ganjam Horn craft, Chitta wall painting (Mural art), Dangaria Kandha, Lanjia Soura Tribal art, Terracotta art, Stone sculptures, Wooden mask paintings, and Sand art. The museum had also other programs on Indian arts and culture for the celebration of Diwali. By seeing the huge crowd and enthusiastic involvement of the audience, the program director of MFA Mrs. Linda Apple mentioned that this event is one of the best program recently.
Odissi Classical Dance, Maana Udharana, based on the famous poem written by Kabi Samrat Upendra Bhanja in 16th century, was presented by Jayashree Kar Mohapatra of Noopur Dance Academy with local artists Arya Mohanty, Priyanka Nanda, Sneha Mahapatra & Shruti Nanda in front of Lord Jagannath idols. Anindita Nanda of Soortaal School of Dance & Music performed Odissi dance Megh Pallavi and Suchilagna Panigrahi of Nrityasadhana performed Basanta Pallavi. Sambalpuri folk dance on Mitrabhanu Gauntia’s Rangabati was performed by Sangya Padhi, Rupali Das, Aneesha Mahapatra, Sushree Kar & Reema Mohanty.
With regards to presentation on Odisha, Sri Ashok Chandra Panda, Odisha Tourism Minister has been very supportive in providing necessary digital content as per OSA’s request. Sri Prasana Das, advisor Odi Art center Chilika had been closely working with OSA for making this event a great success. OSA members Sri Nishikanta Sahoo, Dr. Arun Mohanty and OSA president Sri Sushant Satpathy had been closely working with the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston officials Mrs Linda Apple, Director of community engagement and Mrs Jennifer Leclerc, Manager community engagement, for this event for last several months.
OSA is the the largest non-resident Odia(NRO) socio-cultural community organization that strives to nurture and propagate Odishan rich cultural heritage throughout the North America and promotes the exchange of information between Odisha/India, USA and Canada.