Road From Home by John Mubir & Deo Lutwama
Showing from February 17, 2024 - April 28, 2024
In this joint exhibition, works reflect the memorable visual journey from their home country Uganda through Kenya capturing positive and vibrant memories though climate change, wars and political mismanagement have impacted African societies and the natural environment.
Meet the Artists
Deo Lutwama
Deo studied Interior Design-CIDA/FIDER accredited and Fine Art at Kean University in Union, NJ. After graduation, Deo spent some years working as a designer for New York Expo Designs. Through his work for non-profit organizations for people with developmental disabilities, he better connects his life as an artist to making a difference in the lives of people.
An award winning versatile and talented artist, his work has been exhibited at The Passaic County House in New Jersey, The Passaic County Arts Center – John W. Rea House in New Jersey, The National Museum, Kampala-Uganda, Essex County College Art Gallery, and Kean University School of Industrial Design in New Jersey.
John Mubiru
John Mubiru was born in Uganda, East Africa a son of a civil engineer. Coming from a family with five artists and designers, art become a way of life for John at an early age. He was educated at St. Henry’s College, Kitovu. St Henry’s strong art culture which had already produced a lot of notable African Artists helped shape his early work. Due to civil strife in Uganda his family went into exile to Kenya in 1980 where he attended The Kenya Polytechnic and majored in Applied Sciences and Mechanical Engineering. He later migrated to the United States in 1988. There, John Mubiru studied 3D Computer Animation and Computer Aided Designing at the Center for the Media Arts in Manhattan. These early life experiences impacted strongly on his work and are felt in the way John constructs his social cultural imagery.
While living in Kenya, John an already an avid sculpture and painter, was introduced to Batik (a form of painting on cloth with dyes using wax as a blocker) by Kenyan and exiled Ugandan artists. John then adopted a strong impressionistic abstract and figurative style he learnt while working with Batik. His early style of Batiks was strongly inspired by artists like Wasswa, Noah Nyanzi, Robin Anderson and Mugalula Mukiibi. He worked in this media for eleven years developing a style and technique of his own. After moving to the United States he started working in oils with a strong leaning towards constructivism a style that reflects his background in engineering and design.
As a painter, John still uses the batik medium but also paints in oils on canvas and board. His images are an ongoing social commentary in colours, textures and forms from indigenous subjects of his native Africa, bringing the canvas to life with dances, ceremonies and regalia of the Massai, Turkana, Baganda, Nandi, Swahili and many more tribes of the African plains. In his work we gain an amazing insight into day-to-day activities and lives of a people whose rich culture and tradition is juxtaposed against the beautiful African landscapes.
Artist Statement
Deo Lutwama
Born in Uganda, East Africa, I came to appreciate the beauty of nature and art as being part of myself at an early age. I paint in different mediums; oils, acrylics and pastels and dye (batik) to depict the daily life, folklore and wildlife of Africa. With the ever-fading traditions of African cultures, I strive to represent Africa through my love of painting as storytelling. Like my grandmother used to say, “Healing comes through storytelling and art with the use of color is storytelling in itself.” Most of my oil paintings are celebrated with saturated deep primary colors typical of African art. My biggest influence is Monet’s impressionist painting.
I studied Interior Design-CIDA/FIDER accredited and Fine Art at Kean University in Union, NJ. After graduation, I spent some years working as a designer for New York Expo Designs. My work has been exhibited at The Passaic County Court House in New Jersey, The Passaic County Arts Center – John W. Rea House in New Jersey, The National Museum, Kampala-Uganda, Essex County College Art Gallery, and Kean University School of Industrial Design in New Jersey.
John Mubiru
In this exhibition, I present a short but memorable visual journey from my home country Uganda through Kenya capturing those moments before arriving in the United States. Years of trekking around the world, experiencing different cultures and traditions have eventually forced me to reflect about Uganda the country of my birth and Kenya my location for an African experience. My Uganda is a small landlocked country lying strategically in the middle of the African continent. It is the custodian of some of the most picturesque landscapes, wild life and source of the mighty River Nile. Kenya on the other hand is the tourist capital of the East African coastline with diverse cultures and landscapes also home to world famous wildlife.
Having lived in both these countries, the artworks presented for this show hold memories inspired by a collection of subjects about the people, animals and landscapes of Eastern Africa. The exhibition records both worlds as memories of a Road from Home. My home is changing and so is my art. Climate change, wars and political mismanagement have impacted on societies and the natural environment transforming it into a cultural and environmental desert. However, I still focus on the good memories of my childhood in Africa and use them as a source of my inspiration for this exhibition.
I have made the paintings to not only reflect my individual world but that but also the lives of those people. In the batiks, I use earth colors which gives a natural vibrancy and vitality to them, reflecting various aspects of life recall my earlier social and artistic life. I am showcasing those moments that are still vivid about Uganda and Kenya specifically focusing on moods of warmth, calmness, excitement, somberness to entice a connection with the viewer. In these artworks, I have presented various interpretations of people and animals in motion and, landscapes in various degrees of bloom. I seek organization inspired by the colors of the flora and fauna depicting in natural colors of an African landscape.
The cows and ‘cow-people’ is about the ‘good-feeling’. The standing or marching or dancing Masai are meant to look very stalwart as they appear to be dancing. The colors of the African fabrics still worn today is a memory that I could not escape from in this work. I had to fall back on the gentler and calming effect of colour to balance out the riot of movement. I cannot forget the multitude moving animal shapes. I have used essence of the African landscape to reach out to my audience. My compositions are light and accessible to enable anyone be part of my journey and to share memories of a disappearing Africa.