Leilah Babirye, We Have A History, de Young Museum

Installation view of "Leilah Babirye: We Have a History", de Young, San Francisco, 2024. Photo by Gary Sexton. Image courtesy of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco

By: Melika Sebihi

Our present experiences do not exist in isolation – they are woven from the threads of our culture, memory, and shared histories. This is the ethos that buttresses Leilah Babirye: We Have A History, a collection of twelve contemporary sculptures seamlessly embedded in the permanent Arts of Africa galleries at the de Young Museum. In her first solo exhibition in the United States, the Ugandan artist explores the reclamation of cultural identity and its potential as a vehicle for self-exploration.

Upon entry to the exhibition, we are immediately met by three sisters. Before reading the label for the first work, aptly titled "Bakalipo (Family of Sisters)" (2020), you might find that you know this intuitively because they resemble each other so closely – their oblong, carved faces with eyes that peer at us and lips that pout, not with irritation but with refined elegance and a lack of concern. Two are set atop wooden pedestals while the third hangs on the wall, all adorned with elaborate decorations resembling braids and updos, composed of found materials varying from aluminium, wire, and colorful plastic.

Installation view of "Leilah Babirye: We Have a History", de Young, San Francisco, 2024. Photo by Gary Sexton. Image courtesy of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco
From L to R: “Bakalipo (Family of Sisters),” “Senga Wensonga (Matchmaker Auntie),” "Abambejja ba Kabaka (Sister of the King III),” (2020)

Each of these three figures are a reflection on family and clan structure in Buganda, a Bantu kingdom within Uganda. Named for individual family members such as "Senga Wensonga (Matchmaker Auntie)" and "Abambejja ba Kabaka (Sister of the King III)" (2020), Babirye illustrates her ability to quite literally create Black queer community not out of thin air, but stemming from the Bugandan clan histories and visual culture that predate her. The artist's wooden figures are carved with an electric chainsaw, requiring incredible control and strength to create. In the video accompanying the exhibition, she reveals the intuitive nature of this process, explaining that the sculpture "speaks" to her in a process of co-creation.

Portrait of the artist (2022). Courtesy Stephen Friedman Gallery, London and New York. Photo by Mark Hartman.

The works on view are visually dual, combining elements of traditional figurative sculpture with contemporary discarded materials. This duplicity is not only representative of a tension – between repression and autonomy, tradition and newness – but also highlights resourcefulness as a value. Not only is Babirye resourceful in a literal sense, because of her use of found objects, but she is also resourceful in that she has identified her Ugandan culture as a resource, queerness and Blackness as a resource.

In "Omugole Omukyala Namirembe Kaddulubale (Peaceful Bride of Mwanga II)" (2020), this duality is especially evident. Composed of darkly-stained wood, this figure's elegant neck is decorated with silver nails and sheet metal. It supports a face veiled by the tops of soda cans strung with wire, and adorned with weighty metal earrings and an elaborate multi-tier hairstyle. The use of lustrous silver materials throughout this sculpture makes this bride appear decidedly glamorous, all while still being composed of trash or "ebisiyga," a derogatory term for LGBTQ people in Luganda. Meaning "sugarcane husk," this term refers to the part of the sugarcane that is disposed of.

Leilah Babirye, "Omugole Omukyala Namirembe Kaddulubale (Peaceful Bride of Mwanga II)," 2020

Wood, wax, nails, wire, glue, and found objects (96 1/8 x 36 5/8 x 11 3/4 in. (244.16 x 93.03 x 29.84 cm), Collection of Steve Corkin & Dan Maddalena

The use of discarded materials in Babirye's work is just one aspect of her work that reveals a devotion to material. In "Nakimbugwe from the Kuchu Royal Family of Bugandan" (2024), we see a ceramic figure lush with glaze, an example of the multilayered approach she takes, resulting in glossy, luxuriant surfaces. The wooden pedestal supporting this work was burned to draw out a hazy black surface, after being sanded to expose the wood's natural texture. A long braid, composed of bicycle tire inner tubes, snakes around the top of her head and trails down alongside one side of her face and neck, coiling around on the ground beneath her. The elaborate hairstyles of all Babirye's figures are integral to their individual identities, highlighting Black hair as a symbol of resistance and integral to one's personhood.

Leilah Babirye, "Nakimbugwe from the Kuchu Royal Family of Buganda," 2024

Ceramic, wood, copper, wire, and bicycle tyre inner tubes, 41 x 18 x 18 in., (104.14 x 45.72 x 45.72 cm,). Courtesy of the artist, Stephen Friedman Gallery, London and New York, and Gordon Robichaux, New York

The exhibition concludes with "Katiiti Kalibbala from the Nsenene (Grasshopper) Clan" (2024), not a full-fledged figure sculpture but a mask hung on the wall in a similar style. Babirye once described a pivotal moment in her early queer activism where she watched the funeral of David Kato on television, a gay rights leader in Uganda. Many people in attendance were wearing African masks to conceal their identity for fear of backlash. She references this as a career-defining moment, introducing the idea that tradition can still be wielded as a tool against itself. This conclusion feels intentional, combining themes of duality, culture, and history that define this entire body of work.

Installation view of "Leilah Babirye: We Have a History", de Young, San Francisco, 2024. Photo by Gary Sexton. Image courtesy of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco

L: "Katiiti Kalibbala from the Nsenene (Grasshopper) Clan" (2024)

The act of subverting tradition, a practice often reserved for cultural or institutional critique, somehow denotes a deep reverence in Babirye's work. We Have A History transmits Babirye's ability to use sculpture as a medium for reclaiming one's culture, while suggesting change for the future. This exhibition left me with reflections on my own history, and how it can be a tool for both self-discovery and outrospection.