32 THE BEAT Friday, March 9, 2018 ART REACTION... MUSEVENI’S TAKE THE TRIBUTE MONUMENT President Yoweri Museveni is said to have been impressed in 2006. He only expressed doubt about if the type of gun he held on February 6, 1981 as he commanded his soldiers was similar to that in the sculpture. Although it is not appreciated in Uganda, visual art remains perhaps one of the most important channels to document and preserve our and many society’s history and heritage. recollections from Tumwine and his colleagues to reconstruct the attack, thus enabling them to capture the February 6, 1981 atmosphere. This was to, among other things, enable the artists conceptualise the work. “We understood the risks that accompanied the attack and the context in which it was manoeuvred. We knew that what we were reconstructing represented a decisive The moment that dramatically changed the course of Uganda’s sculptors history forever,” Kyeyune recalls. say it The artistes found a secure place to work at Maria was hard Naita’s home in Mutundwe. Given the limited time to recreating fi nish the work, they had to think fast and spend long a youthful hours at work. In what they describe as a mixture of Museveni excitement and tears, Kyeyune, Naita, Kigozi and team worked under a makeshift studio to complete this work under unforgiving conditions. “The hot sun and dry desiccating wind made WHAT DO clay modelling a harrowing experience. It was YOU THINK? a nightmare keeping the clay moist and soft TWEET US @ which is essential for clay modelling. Cracks developed and sometimes widened with parts From page 24 take on the work because it came THEBEATUG “Tumwine contacted us and asked us of the clay work collapsing to the ground, twice, at such short notice, Kyeyune and AND LET US The vision bearers for this work wanted to consider taking on an assignment we had to start all over again…” his team, who then operated under KNOW a monument that would not only that involved making a commemorative It was a daunting job, especially when it came the name KANN artists, accepted to honour Museveni, but also capture monument. The monument was to depict to rendering a youthful Museveni. take the assignment on. the spirit that ushered the NRM Museveni, the leader of the 1981 attack on “Museveni was a young man in his 30s when The team started off by visiting government into power. Kabamba barracks. We had to do it within these incidents took place and for the monument to Kabamba barracks, where the monument “We wanted this monument to three months,” Kyeyune recalls. have relevance and meaning, we had to wind his clock was to be located. The artists used exhibit courage, vision, ambition Although they were initially reluctant to backwards and give him a younger face with a slender and determination in a permanent body... a daunting task because photos of his youth were material,” Kyeyune says. very scarce and yet those we got were misty. It was a That is why the artists chose fi bre struggle to bring out his person and character,” Kyeyune glass and resin to execute their work. says. The artists had to depict Museveni with an appropriate HOW THE MONUMENT CAME TO LIFE facial expression. “None of the photographs we had “First we produced a skeletal model depicted him in a commanding mood, yet the statue was upon which we applied clay. Once we set in motion with the right hand raise as the left one fi rmly clutched the gun,” Kyeyune says. applied plaster of Paris — a hard cement like surface — over the clay surface to To get their dimensions right, the artistes used a model; capture the clay image. After it had a young energetic man called Nulu Kintu who posed, sometimes for as many as 10 hours under the hot sun to was later dismantled to produce moulds provide a model for the artists. which are also called “the negatives”. Despite all the challenges encountered, this monument “After this, we applied fi bre glass was done and completed on schedule. It was offi cially mixed with resin inside the moulds unveiled on February 6, 2006. which then transforms what originally For Kyeyune and his team, execution of this work was was clay into fi bre glass,” says Kyeyune. never about the money. Rather, it was more about the opportunity to contribute to such an important landmark GETTING THE WORK DONE in the political history of this country. Preparations to produce the Kabamba As part of the commissioning, Tumwine says there was monument started in November no better way to remember such a historical moment in 2005, commissioned by the National Uganda’s history than through art. Enterprise Commission that included “This monument highlights captures an important Chief of Defence Forces then, the late moment in the liberation history of Uganda, when Gen. Aronda Nyakairima, Gen. Elly Museveni ordered the attack; helping to show direction Tumwine, Col. Fred Mwesigye, Maj. and vision for the future. It was put up many years Gen. Robert Rusoke and Col. Felix after the actual attack with many Ugandans enjoying Kulayigye. the fruits of the struggle. There is nothing better than Kyeyune recalls when he and his art in symbolizing and commemorating such historical team got the assignment to execute this moments.” work. Gen. Elly Tumwine inspecting the monument as it was being made.