The Ugandan-Rwandan artist is selected by the collective blaxTARLINES as part of ArtReview’s annual spotlight on individuals whose work is worthy of more attention
Currently based in Uganda, while born to parents from Uganda and Rwanda, Collin Sekajugo’s collaged paintings, principally employing materials such as polypropylene bags, denim fabric, bark cloth, acrylic paint and waste paper, attempt to speak on issues ranging from the social, cultural, political and economic realities from a local perspective with awareness of their global entanglements.
Sekajugo’s success in the art market over the past decade shows how visible his mixed media and pictorial experiments have become in the mainstream. What is not so visible but integral to the artist’s practice is his passion for building local support systems and the human resource capacity necessary for developing the contemporary art ecosystem in his region. Sekajugo’s extrapictorial experiments have led to forays in institution- and community-building, youth empowerment, mentorship and training programmes for aspiring artists, farming, building studios and creating galleries as well as living and leisure facilities in Uganda and Rwanda. For example, he has established Ivuka, the first visual arts space in Kigali; Camp Ndegeya, which has successfully transformed the Ugandan village of Ndegeya, Masaka, into a cultural destination equipped with a sculpture park, camping facilities, an art gallery, children’s library and youth development centre; Amasaka Gallery, also in Masaka, hosting international exhibition projects; and the Weaver Bird Residency nesting creatives for projects, workshops and more. Through these initiatives, he is also actively involved in facilitating institutional exchanges between partners in Africa and around the world.
Sekajugo’s passion for redirecting the proceeds from his art practice into fostering enabling structures in Africa makes him an artist who is working to build capacity beyond the nuclear privileges his studio work brings to him as an individual. He works with local artists and craftspeople to run and manage the facilities while being interested in their independent practices and growth. His silent, yet impactful, interventions bear long-term and generational consequences for Uganda, Rwanda and beyond. He appears to be heeding Okwui Enwezor’s desire, expressed in interviews, for young Africans to not only be guests in the international realm of contemporary art but to be hosts as well; in other words, to be equal partners in shaping the future of art. Sekajugo joins other such notable artists affirming this dictum as Ibrahim Mahama, and Michael Armitage in Kenya, among others. For these reasons, we consider Sekajugo’s interventionist practice worthy of recognition with its transformational impact for contemporary art in the coming years.
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Collin Sekajugo is a Ugandan-Rwandan artist based in Kampala, Uganda. His work centres on sustainability and often features locally sourced and recycled materials. He founded Ivuka Arts Center, Kigali, Rwanda, in 2007 and Amasaka Gallery, Masaka, Uganda, in 2020.
Selected by blaxTARLINES, collective, Kumasi
