Story and photo by Laura Cenge
Through a three-month group exhibition at Uganda Christian University (UCU) in the Hamu Mukasa library, part of the Buganda Kingdom’s past history, as described in the two books written by Hamu Mukasa, Simuda Nyuma:ebiro by a Muteesa (1938) and Simuda Nyuma:ebiro by a Mwanga (1942), was displayed through art. This comes under the subject “Beyond Memories.”
The exhibition opened on October 10, 2022 and is set to close on January 23, 2023. The project is the result of a collaboration between the project-based Tudda Nyuma collective and UCU’s Visual Art and Design (VAD) Department.
Dr. Andrea Stultiens, from Holland said that the exhibition comes from a long artistic investigation of a list that was encountered in the legacy of the late Hamu Mukasa in the library in his “Kwata Mpola House” in Nasuuti in Mukono.
Furthermore, the exhibition Andrea says that as she was looking through Mukasa’s family collection, consisting of photographs, books, and documents as part of her doctoral research on Ugandan photographs, she landed on the book “Simuda Nyuma.”
It has also been noted that a number of Mukasa’s works are available in a digitized version created by her and her partner Canon Griffin as part of the social media platform “History in Progress in Uganda,” which they started in 2011.
Different critiques of art work by various artists, including lecturers at the institution, are displayed in the library as a symbol of commemoration to Hamu Mukasa’s life.
These include “Mr. Mackay’s Cave Named Peace” by Diana Mary Laruni, aka Mary Dee; “The Hand of Time” by Kizito Alexander Ssenkya; “Ekifaananyi kya Muteesa” by Dr. Andrea Stultiens; and “Kyesakiredde Kirumira Mpuyi Biri” by Kamahurigye Precious Elizabeth Kukundakwe.
As of Thursday, January 12, 2023, the family of the late Hamu Mukasa and other invited guests were able to gather and visit the home of the late Nasuuti. They later met again in the library for an in-depth discussion of the book written by one of the great-grandchildren of Hamu Mukasa, titled “The Untold Stories of Uganda Kingdom.”
