The Christiansburg Archaeological Heritage Project (CAHP) is undertaking art paintings on walls of houses at Osu in Accra to depict their historical stories and to promote tourism for the progress of the community.
So far over 10 ancestral houses painted by their trained descendants under the project.
The paintings portrayed images of warriors, scholars, physicians, steel workers, fishermen and fishmongers, food vendors, tailors, among others to tell their stories.
Some of the houses resonate with names like Randoph, the famous historian and an indigene of Osu and Victor Nanka-Bruce, also a famous physician, politician and a journalist from the area.
The project has also established CAHP Community Library to provide the children in skills in drawing as well as general learning.
Professor Ama Asaa Engmann, the lead of the CAHP in an interview after leading the media to inspect the ongoing paintings said the project was being carried out in collaboration with the Osu community and that for the past nine years they had been working together in archaeological expedition at the Christiansburg Castle.
She said they started with archival work earlier, but the excavating begun in 2014 and had discovered a few artefacts, which included slate fragments, typically used for writing, faunal remains, seeds, metals, stones, daub, cowries, among others.
‘This year we decided to expand the project so with a grant from the Mellon Foundation in New York we included heritage, history and art project, hence the art paintings on the walls to tell the stories of some of the historical family houses and notable characters in the community,’ she stated
Prof Engmann, of Critical Heritage, Stanford University, who is also a descendant of former Danish Governor Cal Engmann said the collection of the artifacts would assist in the plans to develop the Castle into a museum.
She called for financial support to replicate the project in other regions of the country to enhance the heritage of Ghanaians and to promote tourism and economic growth of the country.
Speaking to some of the trained artists they said the project had impacted their lives and other members of the community, especially children and adolescent girls by minimising negative social vices such as teenage pregnancies and drug abuse.
Madam Olga Pappoe, the Manager of the Library said the provision of the facility has brought some transformation in the learning and drawing skills of children in the area and appealed to public-spirited individuals and organisations for support.
Source: Ghana News Agency