Painting - Acrylic on found canvas and board

Babirye Leilah is a contemporary visual artist who specializes in abstract sculpture and painting. Her work deals with human rights issues particularly when they are created by politics, social stigma ad economic discrimination. She graduated with a BA in Industrial Fine Art & Design from MTSIFA at Makerere University (Uganda) in 2010, having majored in sculpture.

She has since undertaken residencies at Cherry Grove in Fire Island NY (2015), in Nairobi, Nafisi Art Space in Dar-es-Salaam (2013), and Hospital Field in Scotland (2012). Her work has been exhibited in the Kampla Art Biennale (2014) and KLA ART )14: Kampala Contemporary Art Festival. She has been a participant in some key workshops including Visual AIDS and Women Across Borders, both in New York (2016). She has exhibited at the Darka Art Biennale (2016), and is currently in the ongoing exhibition THINGS FALL APART at the Trapholt Museum, Denmark. She has also been exhibited in AtWork (2015) with curator Simon Njami, Utopia/Dystopia Photographing Peace and Conflict (2013) with photographer Harandane Dicko and manager Hama Goro, Coaching for Ministries Art and Leadership Conference (2013) and RAKU Firing Techniques (2008). Her work has been publicized in MUFF magazine and New Vision, and she has been featured in CCTV Broadcast television and many local television programs in Uganda.

Babirye Leilah’s work explores her personal illegal reality as a gay Ugandan. She creates abstract sculptures through the process of burning, nailing, and reassembling found objects such as books, dollies, and chains. By reworking these objects she allows herself the freedom to reimagine her world and her experience. Her working process is fueled by a need to find her language that she can respond to the recent anti-homosexuality bill. Her grammar becomes the processes of burning and ailing whilst her materials become her words. Sometimes these processes transcend into performances where she buries a fire underground so the earth appears to be burning: the act is symbolic of the experience of the LBGT community in Uganda, underground but not silent.

“I choose materials that relate to personal stories. I am interested in the pain, abandonment and defiance that individuals experience throughout their lives, regardless of the laws and constitutions of our countries.”

“Painting is something that I started when I came here because of the limited space. Still I related to my topics to create my paintings. That is why I look at things like cameras that connect with the media and political issues."