Art in public in Kampala spaces

Artists engaged the public in their work by creating pieces that provoked public reaction (already the twelve shipping containers dotting the different public spaces were a subject of curiosity and conversation among locals).

Several people were seen engaging with festival artists — Ronald ‘Ronex’ Ahibisimbwe, Samson ‘Xenson’ Ssenkaaba, Eria ‘Sane’ Nsubuga, Bruno Ruganzu, Ivan Bwambale, SanaaGateja, Stella Atal, Sue Crozier Thorburn, Donald ‘Waswad’ Wasswa, Emma Wanambwa, Eric Mukalanzi and Lilian Mary Nabulime and — and asking questions about their respective works.

Such interactions provided an opportunity for the public to educate themselves on pressing social issues. Addressing a number of issues, from cultural identity and civil rights to waste management and HIV awareness, the festival became a vehicle of knowledge for the public. Lilian Nabulime’s container at Kampala International University, Kansanga, became a hub for literacy lessons on HIV/AIDS.

In the form of familiar household objects (i.e. baskets, soaps, mortars and pestles), her sculptures facilitated better understandings and discussions on HIV transmission. Inviting the public to speak about and physically engage with her artwork, Nabulime encouraged public participation in hopes of raising awareness.

Endeavouring to sculpt domestic utilities like a dress closet, bed and shoes to communicate a local relevance, Wassad’s Elephania sculptures were decorative in form and covered with leopard spots. Bwabale’s Nakayima installation was inspired by a popular Buganda legend of a big tree in Mubende believed to be a shrine of a female fertility goddess. The artist shaped an incarnation of the mythical tree out of metal sheets — his popular medium — to bridge a gap between traditional and contemporary art.

In his container, he wanted to provoke dialogue between the public and the installation by creating a shrine atmosphere. Using plastic debris, Xenson’s installation Nakivubo Channel aka Omwaala Gwe Nakivubo was a metaphor for waste management and the dumping phenomenon in Kampala. These projects emphasised a practical component of art in public space. The city council’s collaboration with the artists and the respective art institutions opened an opportunity for future partnerships within the city.

Two years later, during the Garbage Collectors Exhibition 2014, Xenson created a life size sculpture of beer cans that mocked the syndrome of consumerism and material culture among the political elite and middle class. Both his installations evoke the need to engage the audience on social issues, as well as the significance of location, medium and technique.

The artist’s choice of medium serves the purpose of creating a dramatic visual effect on the audience, giving the two installations an element of conspicuousness and engaging the attention of the viewer. Promoting public participation, Laba! Art Festival celebrated artists’ creativity and experimentation. The city offered the Goethe Institute two venues free of charge and waived taxes for festival advertising. Such a partnership presented artists with the opportunity to work in public without restrictions. And while these modes of contemporary art in Kampala are still young, such collaborative projects between artists, the public and the city are propagating change.

Indeed, in a city saturated with politics, it is obvious that the government is promoting its own political vocations at the expense of the public. In this context, art is used as tool for gratifying the government’s ego and promoting political ambitions including touristic propaganda in the city. Such priorities are reflected clearly in pieces, such as 50th Independence Anniversary monument 2012, Unknown Soldier 2012 and Stride 2007.  On the contrary, Public art should be used as a medium to educate the public on their civic rights, provide basic infrastructure and promote social change. Does the recent upgrading of the Kira- Kamwokya Road to an arty space reveal such critical engagement?

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The article first appeared in Third text Africa, Vol. 4, published in South Africa