The show that launched the Weganda Gallery exhibited paintings and sculptures owned by founding curator Rodney Muhumuza, a journalist, essayist, editor, and collector based in Kampala. Muhumuza amassed a growing collection of more than 50 paintings and sculptures by some of our most important artists: George W. Kyeyune, Godfrey Banadda, Nuwa Wamala Nnyanzi, Leonard W. Kateete, Lilian Mary Nabulime, Ronex, Ocom Adonias, John Bosco Muramuzi, Sheila Nakitende, Ismael Kateregga, Bruno Sserunkuuma, Canon Griffin Rumanzi, and others.
Many Ugandans are ignorant of the explosion of art around them, and the show’s prophetic central argument was that this fact should – and can – change. In “Rehearsing the Future: Notes on the Fierce Urgency of Collecting,” an essay that outlined the intellectual underpinnings of Kampala’s newest gallery, Muhumuza wrote of those who step into a house like his, filled with books and pictures, and, seemingly confused or out of place, dare to ask, Now how much did you pay for that? “They have an idea that the pieces may not be cheap, but they are looking for confirmation that money has been wasted and I am waiting to confirm my fear that, as solid and educated as they may be, they are not cultured people. At such times I think, rather arrogantly, that one person, just one, can have the uber-consciousness a million Toyota-loving Ugandans don’t have,” he wrote. The show’s overarching goal, therefore, was to try to spread the love of art – one Ugandan at a time.