The restraint and symmetry of this reliquary is characteristic of the subgroup M’Bulu Obamba, with its concave ovoid face bisected with crossed broad metal strips, the remainder of the face covered with narrow metal strips. The hemispherical eyes have nail heads as pupils, and the nose is pointed and dihedral. There is no mouth, and the ‘elephant ears’ which extend on either side and the crescent-shaped headdress are simply engraved with a single line around the outer edge. elegant cylindrical neck, is decorated with ornamented plating engraved with vertical bands. The top half of lozenge base is plated with a simple striated design, while the lower part is left uncovered.

Reliquary figures surmounted cane baskets, mbulu, containing ancestral bones and served as protectors of these bundles. In times of perceived danger, the community would bring these assemblages together in the belief that their cumulative power would offer a greater resistance to external threats. Typically housed in the residence of a family or clan leader, reliquary ensembles broadly offered assistance and protection in shielding their communities from harm, following a belief in the responsiveness of venerated ancestors to appeals from their descendants invoked through sacrifices, medicines, and prayers.

The use of brass and copper to sheathe wooden sculptures is rare in African art. It is possible that these expensive metals alluded to wealth and their use was therefore an appropriate way to honour ancestors or spirits. It is also suggested that the metals were perhaps intended to ward off witches at night, since their brilliance recalled daylight and anathema to witches. The morphology of the sculpture reflects the concern of the Kota with personal beauty, and they stand apart from other African groups in this distinctive approach of combining abstract forms in wood and sheeting them with brass and copper to express a sculptural form.

Beginning in the 1870s, reliquary sculptures such as this one, whose style scholars have especially characterized by its curved adornments at the top and sides of the head, were among the first Kota reliquary figures to arrive in European collections and are most generally attributed to the central Kota-speaking group known as the Obamba. Beginning in the early 20th century, avant-garde artists—including Europeans such as Pablo Picasso, Fernand Léger and Paul Klee, Americans such as Alfred Stieglitz, and Africans such as Ernest Mancoba—widely collected and drew inspiration from Kota art.

In addition to its fantastical form, the reliquary figure has a remarkable provenance: collected in the 19th century in Gabon, most likely by a French colonial officer or missionary, it subsequently entered the collection of the renowned American dealer John Jacob (J.J.) Klejman [1906-1995], a polish émigré who became one of the most important promoters of African art in New York. The figure was subsequently acquired from Klejman by Dr Henry Malcolm Hardy.