Bayunga Nsimba Kialeuka can be easily sprinkled and wrapped into a paradigm of the urban, streetwise, intellectual eccentric, another troubled Basquiat to entertain the topsider-and-blazer pampered set. But that would be a mistake. A native of the Congo and brought to Miami at the age of six, Bayunga has resided in Florida for most of his artistic career, attending the stalwart New World School of the Arts high school and gaining a formal education in the arts during a semester stint at Cooper Union in New York. But the critically diagnosed rigidity that taps color and pain in his works like a reoccurring, jazzy case of scabies has little to do with classical training and much to do with his upbringing's backdrop in Opalocka and a humbling, crippling reaction to the polio vaccine in his later teens, all the while dealing with the harsh daily metropolis stank. Bayunga's personality has risen up to become as driven as a death-knell, and as wise, warm and somber as his paintings.    Essentially, Bayunga is playing the role of artist-as-teacher and the age-old storyteller - outfits commonly tailored to all black men over 30. His artwork can be interpreted as high concept, but, from my standpoint, it is quite utilitarian. "I'm excited about the energy," replies Bayunga, when pitched for his thoughts on Miami's artistic community, "...but I'm also confused about the direction...I feel as though there is a lot missing." He views the perspectives of local artists being culled from a limited survey of Miami's landscape, by an even limited-r segment of wealthy hand-pickers. And, pause, this does indeed grow into a legitimate local observation, one not to be overlooked, but nevertheless done so amidst the enlightening and jovial monotony of Wynwood's weekend gallery walks. Some might go so far as to describe Miami's artistic community as trapped in lackluster conceptualization, tempered experimentalism, and Euro-fab fetishism and dependence, all of which have fostered a strange breed of cultural xenophobia - I'll go that far for you. Bayunga's figurative paintings are large-scale, enhanced by vigorous brush-strokes, overpowering, and gritty in some ways, but somehow gentle and humbling in the end. Sometimes, the rough-edge and vehemence of the work is akin to Van Gogh's famed ruthless and conspicuous gestural technique, which evinces all the tormented emotion and frustration of a productive visionary and still struggling artist. "Omni" (2000), executed in oil, is a portrait of a crew of men in tank tops - what are they, thugs or, possibly, black militants? The central subject has his arms open in a welcoming gesture, his face wielding a too-sly grin. Immediately the viewer is invited to question why this character is so inviting, especially when a friend, behind him, is almost being held back and pointing directly at you. Which character's expressions should be given the most leverage? Should you accept the first stranger's invitation, thus dismissing the possible threat of arising behind him, or back away into the safe polarization and intuition of ill familiarity? It comes back to your own racial affiliation, no? The universality of this occurrence, in which minor details bloom from a core fear, hesitance and frustration, is effectively communicated. What Bayunga describes as "stories of urban existence that you can translate from Wynwood to Santo Domingo to Quitambo, to Gary, Indiana" bring you to the sociopolitical crux of his position, purpose and genuine seriousness. Bikeko Gallery was founded last January in a Wynwood space owned by Lombardi Properties, where urban culture gallery Objex Artspace is nested as well. Seated in his studio above the gallery, Bayunga listens attentively to interview questions, answers them carefully, as gallery co-owner Rafael V. Santana, son of the maverick Dominican Republican journalist of the same name -ck, puffs on cigs and occasionally interjects. It should be noted now that Bayunga's art doesn't strictly aspire to recreate, manifest and debunk the "elevator door opens" analogy that whites often use to discuss the natural and cultural implications of race. It's not that simple in the real world. As Santana colors in, the gallery's present locale in Wynwood used to be a prominent crack den in the late Eighties. "It was so bad, that when the S.W.A.T. team came down there, people were jumping out the windows," he says. "The development going on here now is part of human nature." There isn't so much the militant finger-pointing in Bayunga's works, like one of his blistering untitled pieces completed this year, where a car is passing an incognito figure in the immediate foreground, and the passenger riding in the back is glancing out of the frame. Who's he riding with? It's the foreboding tension, present like a seeping bloody invisible fog sticky all over the shifting crowd that spills across the background. Who knows what is happening in this setting. Is this commotion during a street festival? Or is it an overlapping of experiences and observations at a bustling intersection presented at once? It looks to me like someone is about to get shot back there on the right-hand side. However that could just be the unpredictability of the ghetto, a city, personified or me subconsciously manifesting it. Whatever the hell it is, some Tales from the Hood come off the screen, it courses through Bayunga's pieces - a byproduct of his emigration to the United States from Zaire and into the ghettos of South Florida.   ignore :   Do you consider it part of your goal to help propagate Miami-based artists and their recognition? Bayunga: Miami, to me, has a lot going for itself. The range in cultures is amazing down here. However, what is embarrassing is that many of the cultures here are not cultured about one another. This is embarrassing to me. I cannot speak for other artists. I can only do what comes from my heart. Sometimes when we speak of the street life, people confuse it with images presented in commercial hip hop. I really don't want you to confuse what's being perpetuated in hip hop music with what living out here is truly about. I want you to understand the life, and the decisions that people make along with the consequences of these. Just look north and south of this block, and see who is walking up and down the streets. Pay attention to who is traveling south on Second, and inquire as to where they're going. What is driving them to take this trek on a daily basis? But people are getting kicked out of this neighborhood, people who've been here for over 30 years. ignore : Yeah, I see the rapidity in the development...I also see, in your art, this gestural quality that takes subject matter from the socioeconomic background of everyday existence in Miami. Coming here and having to find work, getting on the bus to work, seeing all the day laborers, then being on South Beach throughout the day seeing people in the exact opposite situation. ignore : How does the reaction to your work differ between white people, black people, and Hispanic people? Do you care about that, and do you see much of a difference? Also, do you have any observations or a personal stance about the commonality of the word "nigga." [slight laughter] To be honest, sometimes I do care. I do care when the point is not understood. I'm here to share with everyone...race does become an issue with certain aspects but I don't dwell on that. The reason I say this is because I can only deal with my own reality. In Opalocka I grew up with that, and I only saw black faces associated with it when the word was being tossed around. It wasn't until I began to get older that I started to see young people of different backgrounds and complexions use it among one another. At first I was looking back, seeing that we're using the n-word almost as if we are in some sort of secret society...as a way of saying, "Let's talk amongst ourselves." Then at the same time I would see the elder black Americans saying, "Look, we suffered quite a bit for this word. How can you just throw it around like that?" As a result of this I decided to use the word only in very, very private settings. I don't openly toss the word around.   I'm trying to understand why it doesn't get out of this small group...It's serving another purpose. It's part of the "glue." But I want to change the lens, when looking at the neighborhood. You need to really look at these people because, whether you want to admit it or not, they are people. I just think it's unfortunate when they're just seen as characters. These people that are living such hard lives...they motivate creativity. ignore : Yeah...the artists they thrive off the schism. I can be disturbed by it, but as artists...all artists feed off it. When some kid's out-of-town friends get robbed after making a requisite stop at Objex and then, all too frantically, he attempts to call the cops at the corner c-store, that's Bayunga. Or when you're traipsing to Damien B. down the street and some vagrant at a makeshift bus stop suddenly gives you a wink - that's Bayunga - his art and sensibility. "The idea of high art, but high art that is not reserved in perpetuating these images that are not as fashionable: I think a lot of times the image of a black person, whether male or female, is depicted in a way that National Geographic would show them," he explains. "I want to do much more than that. Many times people see themselves as anthropologists when viewing black culture...This is where I connect them with questions like, 'If you really knew someone like 2Pac, would you like him?' I try to share these ideas with as much honesty as I can convey." Bikeko Gallery is located at 215 NW 36 th St., Miami (Wynwood Arts District). Call 305-576-8151 for more info. Artwork by Bayunga Kialeuka