Mask - Gabon (No reserve price)

One might wonder how peoples who are ultimately quite close, wanting to represent the same concept of reliquary guardian and using the same materials (wood covered with metal), could have arrived at expressions so markedly differentiated from the lots offered in this sale. One of the sources of this diversity surely lies in the double reading that can be made of Kota reliquaries: a secular reading expressing the legitimacy, power, and wealth of a community, but also a more mystical reading emphasizing the world of spirits and their potential “magical” power (for lack of a better word). It is easy to understand that these two messages, as valid and important as each other, tend to lead to two antagonistic aesthetics: the affirmation of the