A Pictorial Of Buganda’s Birth

IN this age, when the beauty of our cultural past is fading, an occasional voice cries out from the ‘wilderness’ against the devastation. One such voice is that of Damalie Mbasege. She is a lover of art, culture and tradition. Her down to earth oil paintings have recreated the beauty of Buganda’s cultural past.The displays at Victory gallery, Jumbo Plaza, rekindle Buganda’s history, legends and tradition. The form of her paintings and imbued shades of oil paint on canvas and murals narrate the history with passion, sensitivity and graphic imagination. From left to right, each of her pieces is a plot revealing a stage of the story as it consciously unfolds. She dominantly applies timid colours for the landscape and demi-gods. A colour trait that discloses dormancy on earth prior to man’s settlement. The almost static and inactive portrayal of the demi-gods painted against a background of clouds bustling with life and activity is relevant to the plot.In her paintings Kintu and Nambi, activity deliberately gets busier in an ascending diagonal angle towards the clouds (heaven). It aptly recounts Kintu’s proverbial exodus to heaven in search of a wife, Nambi.The tone of colour lightens as the story progresses, symbolising hope and human existence on earth. However, the scanty dark hue she introduces in her painting, Uncle Walumbe Visiting, is a poignant metaphor of suffering and death. Walumbe’s initially harmless and childish games degenerate in cruelty and the murder of Kintu’s descendants.Her artistic narrative instantly climaxes with Kintu inaugurated as Buganda’s first King and Kayikuzi in heated pursuit of Walumbe. In her four-year research, Damalie observed sharply, noted minutely and listened vigilantly. As a result, she transformed legendary tales into ‘speaking images’. She is a poet in art, seeking revival and conservation of culture. Her art works recall, with nostalgia, the fading beauty of Buganda’s history and tradition. Her depiction of ancient demi-gods is frightening and dull, yet compelling. The relevance of these legends in the historical plot is almost indisputable. Damalie successfully weaves an exciting and tragic story portraying vice and virtue told at the dawn of man’s occupation of earth. The story, recounted over centuries, became Buganda’s proverbial legend. She delicately curves miniature sculptures explaining the origins of old Kiganda social vices like night dancing.The art-works appear simple yet their simplicity is deceptive. It hides the extreme skill employed to historic detail and the power of an artist’s creation. Ends