-Aaron Samuel Mulenga is a Zambian visual artist whose practice spans painting, sculpture, photography, and installation. His work investigates memory, colonial legacy, and the quiet rituals through which communities carry their histories forward.
+Aaron Samuel Mulenga is a Zambian visual artist whose practice spans installation, sculpture, coffee painting, and drawings. His practice investigates cultural memory, speculative imaginations of the future, and how shared communities create environments of care that center love, equity and hope for the future.
-Working primarily with coffee, bronze, burlap, and found material, Mulenga draws on the textures of everyday Zambian life — and on the long shadows cast by empire — to compose images that are at once intimate and historical.
+Mulenga’s work is directly inspired by Zambia’s vibrant culture and rich history. His 2D work incorporates collage, painting and drawing by using coffee and African print fabric on burlap and canvas. Mulenga’s sculptures and installations are made in bronze, wood, and found material, reminiscent of the bricolage practices found in masquerade practices in the country.
-He has exhibited in Lusaka, Berlin, and across the United States, and continues to develop bodies of work that pair archival research with material experimentation.
+Mulenga's work seeks to foreground little known Zambian narratives such as in the work of the Zambian WWI porters, and Zambian space explorers, which he explores in his Tenga-Tenga and Afronauts series respectively.
+
+Mulenga has exhibited in Lusaka, Berlin, and across the United States, and continues to develop bodies of work that pair archival research with material experimentation.
Contact
+For inquiries about works, exhibitions or commissions, send a message below.
+ +{{ exhibition.title }}
+ {%- if exhibition.subtitle %}{{ exhibition.subtitle }}
{% endif -%} {%- if exhibition.venue %}{{ exhibition.venue }}
{% endif -%} {%- if exhibition.date %}{{ exhibition.date }}
{% endif -%} - {%- if exhibition.description %}{{ exhibition.description }}
{% endif -%}
+ {%- if exhibition.description -%}
+
+ {%- if exhibition.description is string -%}
+ {{ exhibition.description }}
+ {%- else -%}
+ {%- for para in exhibition.description %}
+ {%- endif -%}
{{ para }}
{% endfor -%} + {%- endif -%} + {%- if exhibition.credit %}– {{ exhibition.credit }}
{% endif -%} +
{%- for image in exhibition.images -%}
diff --git a/content/index.njk b/content/index.njk
index 9bfed45..23de6c8 100644
--- a/content/index.njk
+++ b/content/index.njk
@@ -2,24 +2,67 @@
layout: base.njk
section: home
permalink: /
+# Slides follow Aaron's "Home Page Carousel Images" folder (1 to 10), then the
+# two works that were already in the carousel. "image" looks a work up in
+# projects.json; "src" is a homepage-only photo with its own alt text and link.
featured:
- - pillars.webp
- - afronaut-jojo.webp
- - intanda-nga-shakumana-when-the-stars-meet.webp
- - meditate.webp
+ - image: afronaut-mwamba.webp
+ - src: home/02.webp
+ alt: Bronze Afronaut figure
+ href: /exhibitions/#ukupupuka
+ - image: meditate.webp
+ - src: home/04.webp
+ alt: Black and gold cast fists rising from mealie meal
+ href: /exhibitions/#simple-commodities
+ - src: home/05.webp
+ alt: Installation of charcoal sacks and burlap
+ href: /exhibitions/#simple-commodities
+ - image: intanda-nga-shakumana-when-the-stars-meet.webp
+ - src: home/07.webp
+ alt: Three figures in burlap and gold, hands together in prayer
+ - src: home/08.webp
+ alt: Burlap hanging with haloed figures and woven forms
+ href: /exhibitions/#simple-commodities
+ - image: tengatenga-a-sweet-re-imaging-of-historys-narrative.webp
+ - src: home/10.webp
+ alt: Ulupwa
+ href: /exhibitions/#ukupupuka
+ - image: pillars.webp
+ - image: afronaut-jojo.webp
---
- {%- for filename in featured -%}
- {%- set project = projects | findByImage(filename) -%}
- {%- if project -%}
-
-
- 
+ {%- set slideIndex = 0 -%}
+ {%- for item in featured -%}
+ {%- set src = "" -%}
+ {%- if item.image -%}
+ {%- set project = projects | findByImage(item.image) -%}
+ {%- if project -%}
+ {%- set src = "/images/" + project.image -%}
+ {%- set alt = project.title -%}
+ {#- Works without a project group are shown in the Ukupupuka exhibition, not on the Projects page. -#}
+ {%- set href = ("/projects/#" + (project.title | slug)) if project.project else "/exhibitions/#ukupupuka" -%}
+ {%- endif -%}
+ {%- elif item.src -%}
+ {%- set src = "/images/" + item.src -%}
+ {%- set alt = item.alt -%}
+ {%- set href = item.href -%}
+ {%- endif -%}
+ {%- if src -%}
+
diff --git a/content/news/2026-11-07-competing-cosmologies-wende.md b/content/news/2026-11-07-competing-cosmologies-wende.md
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..3efe01b
--- /dev/null
+++ b/content/news/2026-11-07-competing-cosmologies-wende.md
@@ -0,0 +1,8 @@
+---
+title: "Exhibition — Competing Cosmologies: Interpreting the Sky"
+date: 2026-11-07
+---
+
+A group exhibition at the Wende Museum in Culver City, California, November 7, 2026 – October 17, 2027, co-curated by the Wende's curatorial department and NASA historian Lois Rosson. The show looks at how space science from the Cold War onward shaped artists around the world, in four sections: Astronomy, the Space Race, Futurisms, and Aliens.
+
+[View the exhibition at the Wende Museum](https://wendemuseum.org/exhibition/cosmos/)
diff --git a/content/projects/index.njk b/content/projects/index.njk
index 9cccc0a..0565d72 100644
--- a/content/projects/index.njk
+++ b/content/projects/index.njk
@@ -10,12 +10,10 @@ permalink: /projects/
+ {%- set slideIndex = 0 -%}
+ {%- for item in featured -%}
+ {%- set src = "" -%}
+ {%- if item.image -%}
+ {%- set project = projects | findByImage(item.image) -%}
+ {%- if project -%}
+ {%- set src = "/images/" + project.image -%}
+ {%- set alt = project.title -%}
+ {#- Works without a project group are shown in the Ukupupuka exhibition, not on the Projects page. -#}
+ {%- set href = ("/projects/#" + (project.title | slug)) if project.project else "/exhibitions/#ukupupuka" -%}
+ {%- endif -%}
+ {%- elif item.src -%}
+ {%- set src = "/images/" + item.src -%}
+ {%- set alt = item.alt -%}
+ {%- set href = item.href -%}
+ {%- endif -%}
+ {%- if src -%}
+
+ {%- if href %}
+
+ 
0 %} loading="lazy"{% endif %}>
+ {%- else %}
+ 0 %} loading="lazy"{% endif %}>
+ {%- endif %}
+ {%- set slideIndex = slideIndex + 1 -%}
{%- endif -%}
{%- endfor -%}
+
+