Wednesday 31 December 2014

UCASDR NEWS 2015


UCASDR Fundraiser Drive 2015
Uganda community Art skill Development and recycling (UCASDR) is starting a Fundraising Drive in 2015 for a  community skills Development, Recycling and Innovation Center at Nansana Katooke Wakiso District

The Center will offer sheltered space for people in the community to work and display products from different  ongoing projects
Wishing You a happy New year 2015!!
Tusiime Mathias
Director
UCASDR

Tuesday 23 December 2014

Equal opportunities



Title:Equal opportunities
  The meaning  of this work  emphasizes that all people should be treated equally irrespective of race, economic status etc. For example in the above artwork of children are selling fruits, they have the knowledge to attend school but have no opportunity. Therefore chances should be open to everybody such that we all compete within the framework of goals.
Thanks!!

Makerere University Mass Communication students,Harriet Bwango and Tusiime Angella to Visit me!!!



Last week I had a pleasure of meeting  Makerere University Mass Communication students,Harriet Bwango and Tusiime Angella.
They did  a documentary about my Artistic experience in Uganda,Work experience at Makerere University College of Engineering Design Art and Technology and my daily life experience in Uganda, also the Video will include the internationally experience.
The Documentary will be shown on all Medias in Uganda and it will be published soon!!!!.
Please keep on following me!!!!!
Tusiime Mathias

Tuesday 9 December 2014

Skills Development and Innovation Training

                                          Design
                                      Finished Shoe products for low income Earners
Through skills Development and innovation, a project of Uganda community Art skills Development
 and recycling.
This is our second weekend Training  Designing  simple shoes for the low income earners in the community, participants  learnt to use recycled clothes  to decorate the shoes straps above are finished products.
 Please,Keep on following me every one  is welcome to join me
so that we can make a change in the society,I believe Art can change the community.

Thursday 4 December 2014

Skills Development and Innovation.Craft Shoe making training at Makerere Kataka Women's group



                                                            Designs process
                                                      Design Process
                                                          Design processes 

  Commonly people get sick when they step in dirty places barefooted.
We are training mothers to make craft shoes, for economic
sustainability and to reduce diseases caused by stepping  in
dirty/infested areas.
The training will last for four weekends and the women will make and
design simple craft shoes for low income earners in the community.
This training is organized by skills Development and innovations a
project of Uganda community Art skills Development and Recycling.

Thanks are due to the following people:

Dr. Alex Klaphake Director GIZ Uganda for the financial contribution
Anja.Kramer Director  KFW
Mr. J.B. Kanuge Lecturer, Makerere University Art school
Betsy Brown our  Project Adviser
Roger Buzizi our volunteer

Friday 14 November 2014

Living as a cleaner, lecturer


 


saturday
November 8, 2014

 

Living as a cleaner, lecturer

http://www.monitor.co.ug/image/view/-/688874/data/43/-/345rd6z/-/ico_plus.png



Some of the paints of Mathias Tusiime. Photos by Ismail Kezaala.

 Written,By Douglas D SSemabala

When he modestly lists his achievements as an artist, it is hard to believe that in 1998, Mathias Tusiime’s search for employment in Kampala stationed him as a cleaner at Makerere University’s Margaret Trowell School of Industrial Fine Art. He now blogs (TusiimeMathias.blogspot.com), has represented Uganda in more than 12 African countries, and has lectured students in American Universities.

Born in Igara, Bushenyi District, Tusiime’s education was clogged by failure to raise fees at O-Level when he was at Bugongi Secondary School in 1994 in Sheema District.

Forced to hunt for jobs without any form of qualification, Prof Philip Kwesiga, (former Dean at Makerere University’s Margaret Trowell School) recommended him for a job as a grounds man. “I cleaned the compound, gathered clay for students and prepared it for their next classes. But now, I clean the offices,” Tusiime explains, picking little crumps of dirt off a table cloth in the gallery and repositioning it.

As a child, his creative mind drew its own imagery of what else he can make out of different material. The gallery administrator at the school, only identified as Hasifa, reflects this notion, arguing that Tusiime is enthusiastic, intrigued and motivated by what he sees around him. His interaction with students, professors and intervals as sculpture studio assistant, contributed to his skill. He had neither held a paint brush, nor molded clay figures before, but this pushed his creativity, thus innovation of his own brand of canvas and locally made paper.

“I received no art training, but I am humbled by my success as an artist,” he says, noting when Pietro Averona, the Italian Cultural Attaché, now Console at the Italian Embassy, bought three of his pieces in 1999. “He was the first person to buy my work. He found it original and uncontaminated,” he says.

Tusiime has since exhibited in Netherlands, Denmark, USA, Nairobi, China (during Olympics), London and Bonham (www.bonhams.com/auctions /19513/lot/6/) in 2013; and at the German Development Co-operation (KFW) October 8, 2014.

Tusiime recollects how Americans walked up to him on the street, some in tears; moved by his inspiring story. “I made headlines in Florida. People wondered how incredible professors at Makerere should be, if a cleaner could create such work!” he said as goose bumps plastered his right hand.

“The first time I stood up to share my work with more than 600 students in Florida, I cried…I could not believe the recognition so far from home!” Invitations to tutor and share his work waved in from Children’s Art Center and North Eastern University in Boston, and Apex Art, New York.

Future plans
Tusiime hopes to develop skills and innovation centres that will provide basic skills to the unprivileged, by reaching people with talents that can be developed, especially those without access to education. He hopes to utilise more natural resources for Tie and dye, craft, candle bars, paper, plates, toys and jewellery.

As a cleaner/self-made artist and researcher, he envisions a recycling plant that can utilise garbage collected or disposed of by the university. Why not create material or recycle to reduce export?” he asks.
Prof Philip Kwesiga, (former Dean at Makerere University’s Margaret Trowell School and his mentor) asserts that “Mathias can be anything the artist can be, because art creates one’s own means to communicate, and he originally does this through size and shape to show mood and feelings.”

Some of Tusiime’s most notable pieces

From Grass to Sisal, Canvas. This 2005 innovation gives illusion of a network of coloured strings on rubber-like surface. He used recycled paint from and grasses before improving it with maize scarves and Sisal. The first of its kind in the world, his canvas won recognition at the Congress Library in Washington DC, USA. It also serves as Vehicle Carpets, Sound Proof material and covers.

Politics of Destruction. One among more than 200 pieces, this visual in bright shades of orange, blue and green, depicts humans with fork-like fingers hovering over their heads. This painting tackles social-economic and political challenges of Ugandan society.

Backcloth paper. Pressed into fine pieces of smooth brown surface, this bark of Mutuba tree, offers alternative for paper. To make backcloth relevant to education, rather than the predominant warmth cover, Tusiime thought of students who need where to write in the face of costly exported paper.

 

Challenges

When he modestly lists his achievements as an artist, it is hard to believe that in 1998, Mathias Tusiime’s search for employment in Kampala stationed him as a cleaner at Makerere University’s Margaret Trowell School of Industrial Fine Art. He now blogs (TusiimeMathias.blogspot.com), has represented Uganda in more than 12 African countries, and has lectured students in American Universities.

Born in Igara, Bushenyi District, Tusiime’s education was clogged by failure to raise fees at O-Level when he was at Bugongi Secondary School in 1994 in Sheema District.

Forced to hunt for jobs without any form of qualification, Prof Philip Kwesiga, (former Dean at Makerere University’s Margaret Trowell School) recommended him for a job as a grounds man. “I cleaned the compound, gathered clay for students and prepared it for their next classes. But now, I clean the offices,” Tusiime explains, picking little crumps of dirt off a table cloth in the gallery and repositioning it.

As a child, his creative mind drew its own imagery of what else he can make out of different material. The gallery administrator at the school, only identified as Hasifa, reflects this notion, arguing that Tusiime is enthusiastic, intrigued and motivated by what he sees around him. His interaction with students, professors and intervals as sculpture studio assistant, contributed to his skill. He had neither held a paint brush, nor molded clay figures before, but this pushed his creativity, thus innovation of his own brand of canvas and locally made paper.

“I received no art training, but I am humbled by my success as an artist,” he says, noting when Pietro Averona, the Italian Cultural Attaché, now Console at the Italian Embassy, bought three of his pieces in 1999. “He was the first person to buy my work. He found it original and uncontaminated,” he says.

Tusiime has since exhibited in Netherlands, Denmark, USA, Nairobi, China (during Olympics), London and Bonham (www.bonhams.com/auctions /19513/lot/6/) in 2013; and at the German Development Co-operation (KFW) October 8, 2014.

Tusiime recollects how Americans walked up to him on the street, some in tears; moved by his inspiring story. “I made headlines in Florida. People wondered how incredible professors at Makerere should be, if a cleaner could create such work!” he said as goose bumps plastered his right hand.

“The first time I stood up to share my work with more than 600 students in Florida, I cried…I could not believe the recognition so far from home!” Invitations to tutor and share his work waved in from Children’s Art Center and North Eastern University in Boston, and Apex Art, New York.

Future plans
Tusiime hopes to develop skills and innovation centres that will provide basic skills to the unprivileged, by reaching people with talents that can be developed, especially those without access to education. He hopes to utilise more natural resources for Tie and dye, craft, candle bars, paper, plates, toys and jewellery.

As a cleaner/self-made artist and researcher, he envisions a recycling plant that can utilise garbage collected or disposed of by the university. Why not create material or recycle to reduce export?” he asks.
Prof Philip Kwesiga, (former Dean at Makerere University’s Margaret Trowell School and his mentor) asserts that “Mathias can be anything the artist can be, because art creates one’s own means to communicate, and he originally does this through size and shape to show mood and feelings.”

Some of Tusiime’s most notable pieces

From Grass to Sisal, Canvas. This 2005 innovation gives illusion of a network of coloured strings on rubber-like surface. He used recycled paint from and grasses before improving it with maize scarves and Sisal. The first of its kind in the world, his canvas won recognition at the Congress Library in Washington DC, USA. It also serves as Vehicle Carpets, Sound Proof material and covers.

Politics of Destruction. One among more than 200 pieces, this visual in bright shades of orange, blue and green, depicts humans with fork-like fingers hovering over their heads. This painting tackles social-economic and political challenges of Ugandan society.

Backcloth paper. Pressed into fine pieces of smooth brown surface, this bark of Mutuba tree, offers alternative for paper. To make backcloth relevant to education, rather than the predominant warmth cover, Tusiime thought of students who need where to write in the face of costly exported paper.

 

http://www.monitor.co.ug/artsculture/Reviews/Living-as-a-cleaner--lecturer/-/691232/2514874/-/item/0/-/xxk7iwz/-/index.html

Thursday 23 October 2014

Welcoming Ms Betsy Brown to Uganda Community Art Skills Development and Recycling(UCASDR).



I would like to officially welcome Ms Betsy Brown to the Uganda community Art skills Development and Recycling, team as a Volunteer and the project adviser. she brings on board a wealthy of skills project evaluation and innovation.
she has been to Uganda on two occasions she regards it as her second home.
she has greatly supported Ucasdr activities directly and indirectly .
 Therefore  I thank her  for offering this service to  Uganda CommunityArt Skills Development and Recycling .This gesture is appreciated and acknowledged by the UCASDR team and the community it serves.
Tusiime Mathias
Director
UCASDR

Monday 20 October 2014

Barkcloth paper from Uganda Bark Tree(Omutooma) this is a Research and innovation by Tusiime Mathias this discovery will help to add Value on Barkcloth and the altanative for Education in Uganda.

Above is the hand made paper from Bark cloth Tree by Tusiime Mathias
Above is the Art work made on the Uganda Hand made Bark cloth paper by Tusiime mathias 



Please keep on following me more  Innovations coming up!!