Kota-Wumbu Reliquary Figure, Gabon

on a base by the Japanese wood artist Kichizô Inagaki (1876-1951), Paris

Helena Rubinstein, Paris and New York
Sotheby Parke-Bernet, New York, The Helena Rubinstein Collection, April 29, 1966, lot 196
Harry Franklin, Los Angeles, acquired at the above auction
Valerie Franklin, Los Angeles, by descent from the above
Edwin and Cherie Silver, Los Angeles, acquired from the above in 1989

Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, Portraits of Madame, 1976

The eccentric aesthetic of this Kota, once in the collection of cosmetics magnate Helena Rubinstein, and which Edwin Silver referred to as his "harlequin", conveys a quizzical expression with bright, slightly uneven, copper diamond-shaped eyes. These are placed on a concave face quartered by thick overlapping brass strips on a copper ground, with a pyramidal nose above a small cross-hatched almond shaped mouth. The crest is bisected by a vertical field of interlocking design of stacked repoussé bars separated by chased crosshatching and punctuated with hammered pins. A line of vertically pointed circles crowns the top edge, each affixed with a central pin; these irregular circular attachments also dot the front of the figure's 'body'. The unique, archaic style of this figure suggests particularly great age, a supposition supported by the presence of a native binding repair, made in situ before the figure left its original context, as well as the greatly weathered bottom part of the lozenge. On the reverse, a highly stylized abstract human face is composed of simple arched brows above horizontal hatch marks for eyes, on a raised narrow vertical diamond, reminiscent of the aesthetics of the iconic masks of the Kota’s neighbors, the Kwele.