The Arrival and Revival OF Azulejo in Goa

This is the journey of glazed tiles from ancient Egypt to Spain to finally arriving on sunny Goan shores, but not before dying out and getting revived later by a young Goan lad.

Azulejo mural - 'Lali- Carvela- 600 sqft.'  Source-  Azulejos de Goa - murals

Lisbon’s Fronteira Palace, Port’s São Bento Station, Goa’s Church of St Augustine,  Krishnadas Shama Goa Central Library, Institute Menezes Braganza and the recently inaugurated Mopa International Airport. The walls of all these buildings share one element in common.

All these have walls beautifully clad with blue and white tiles called Azulejo, pronounced aah-zoo-lay-jshu . The tile's origins lie in ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia. Subsequently, the Sassanid Persians rediscovered the use of tin as a substance that could render glass opaque. This technique was quickly picked up by their neighbours, the Abbasids, and thus it spread across the Arab-Muslim world. The Moors then introduced it to Spain in the 13th century, not in the form of Azulejo, but as Alicatado. Alicatado is a mosaic formed by carefully cut tile pieces. With its disadvantages, such as intense manual labour, long process, and high wastage, it quickly evolved into Azulejo as we know it today. During the 15th century, when King Manuel I of Portugal visited Spain, he took a liking to it and brought it to Portuguese shores. Finally, by the 16th century, settled potters and trained Portuguese ended the import of the tiles, and began making them locally from scratch, consolidating Azulejo into Portugal's architecture and heritage.

After Portugal, the Goan history of these painted tin-glazed ceramic tile-work can be understood in the period between the actions of two men, separated by approximately 500 years! One is a Portuguese governor who led the conquest of Goa and the other is a young Goan lad with a passion for playing the Portuguese guitar.  Afonso de Albuquerque, the Portuguese governor, successfully conquered the port city of Goa on December 1st, 1510, despite it not being in the original plan drawn up by his King. Thus, an unexpected Portuguese influx into Goan culture began and continued till 1961. The latter half of the 1500s saw the emergence of Azulejo work in Goa. The Portuguese were influential in Goa way up til the twentieth century. While the Portuguese monarchy collapsed in 1910 and India gained independence in 1947, Goa continued to remain under Portuguese control. The independence movement for Goa picked up in 1954 and finally culminated in 'Operation Vijay'. This bloodless operation lasted from 18th December to 19th December 1961, and the thriving community of Azulejo makers petered out, leading to the end of Azulejo in Goa.

This wasn't the climax for the tile work but only a pause in its long history. In 1974, Orlando de Norhona was born in Goa and 24 years later he would go on to become the man who brought back the Azulejo to Goan walls. In 1997, a passion for playing the beautiful Portuguese guitar made him apply for a scholarship to study at the University of Coimbra. As music was not an element of the scholarship, he ended up going to study Portuguese literature and language there. He moved to Coimbra and while living with a Goan family there, also picked up the Coimbra style of the Portuguese guitar. His tryst with the famed tile began through the artist Fernando Martins, who had painted a guitar player on Azulejo in the family dining room there.

Orlando gradually fell in love with this craft and returned a year later with a bag full of Azulejo tiles and a book - 'Azulejos Arte e História', which would go to become his guide to show to potential clients.

He started by making small plaques and name boards. His moment to shine came in 1999 with the Taj Exotica Hotel. A mural there became his first large-scale work and propelled the long journey to bring Azulejo across Goa again. Hotel after hotel now wanted to have Azulejo in one space or the other! He started with a faulty furnace purchased from Mumbai and a single artist to help him under a staircase in his house in Panjim. Gradually, the business expanded and in 2019, moved to another wing of the house. The Panjim studio is known today as Azulejos de Goa, a studio and gallery, sitting in a 250-year-old family building along with other cultural initiatives of the Norhona family.

Orlando continues to happily work from his studio, managing the cafe and cultural activities, being picky about large murals and mostly working on small objects. Unfazed by plagiarism, Orlando is just content that the artwork has at least survived and continues to thrive across Goan homes, hotels, churches, restaurants, shops, railway stations, sidewalks, nameplates, coasters and tables. This precious Goan heritage will now survive for posterity.