A magnificent Kuyu ceremonial head

rising from the flared and faceted staff beneath the thick neck encircled by an elaborate collar, the broad face with full lips parted and baring thinly carved finely pointed teeth, the wide nose framed by naturalistic downcast eyes outlined by raised lids with inset pupils enhanced by kaolin, the rounded forehead with a central disc-like protrusion, the forehead and cheeks with bands of diamond-shaped scarification leading to backswept ears  and wearing a cap-like coiffure pierced overall and down the nape of the neck for insertion with some remnants of wooden pegs remaining; '3000' in white pigment and '270' in dark pigment at the base of the neck; fine and varied reddish brown patina overall.

Alan Sawyer, Washington, D. C.
Acquired from Stolper Galleries, Morton Lipkin and Robert Stolper, Amsterdam, April 12, 1967

Paris, Musée de l’Homme, Arts de l’Union Française, 1953
Brooklyn Museum of Art, 1968-1976

Musée de l’Homme, Arts de l’Union Française, plate 7, catalogue of the exhibition, Paris 1953
Gillon 1979: 98
Armstrong 1981: figure 43 
Bastin 1984: 266, figure 280

The Kuyu people, neighbors of the Mboshi, live on the east and west sides of the Kuyu River, a tributary of the Likouala River, which flows into the Congo River in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. According to first-hand documentation provided by the French colonial administrator, M. A. Poupon, in his article 'Etude Ethnographique de la Tribu Kouyo' (1918-1919), the Kuyu are divided equally among eastern and western groups. Traditionally the eastern group followed the teaching of the Serpent, djo, and the western group followed the Panther (see Bénézech 1988: 56-57). 

The Brill Kuyu head belongs to a small group of heads classified by Bénézech (1988: 54-55) as ‘style I’. Contrary to heads of 'style III', heads of ‘style I’ were never danced. Instead, their use seems to have been connected with the end of the ceremonies (Anne-Marie Bénézech, personal communication).

Kuyu works of art of similar refinement are rare. Only a few other sculptures of  comparable quality and strong physiognomy are known: see Ader, Picard, Tajan, October 16, 1989, lot 54 for another head by the same hand, collected between 1910 and 1914 by Governor Georges Thomann; Enchères Rive Gauche, 17-18 June, 2006, lot 189 for a standing figure from the Vérité Collection; Vogel (1981: 197) for a related figure from the Tishman Collection; and Clarke (2001: figure 30) for another figure from the Gussman Collection (formerly Leff Collection). The Brill head, however, is unsurpassed in its merger of artistic delicacy and savage expressiveness. The composition of drooping eyes in trance-like expression in contrast to a gaping mouth with sharp, ferocious teeth can be understood as an allusion to the moment of transcendence of spiritual power during the important ceremonies. The artist's mastery in depicting this moment beyond time makes the Brill head arguably one of the most important Kuyu sculptures known.