The present kundul statue counts among one of the best of its type. Kundul are one of the most radically abstract figurative conceptions found in the middle Benue River Valley, with large heads and elongated necks surmounting cylindrical torsos. This figure reduces the human form to a bare minimum of basic columnar shapes. The arms in raised relief are sculpted as a closed oval shape, framing a protruding umbilicus. The head is also highly stylized, with the ears, nose, and mouth portrayed as a set of sharply angular forms. Wurkun men once filed their teeth, represented here by incisions on the mouth. As part of the kundul’s ritual activation it was anointed with water and red ocher and ‘fed’ a grain-based local beer, resulting in a deep multi-layered patina. The present example shows remarkable signs of old age and long traditional use as a shrine object. The statue is standing on an iron spike hammered into the base that secured the sculpture to the ground and protected the wood from termites. This fine example shares the stylistic features common to male kundul. According to Joerg Adelbergers (Berns, Fardon and Kasfir, "Central Nigeria Unmasked: Arts of the Benue River Valley", 2011, pp. 425-432), who undertook extensive field research on the Wurkun, male gender is identified, as in this figure, by the high transverse crest atop the head, which depicts the dance helmets with side flaps that men wore on ceremonial occasions.

“Wurkun”

The cluster of groups living in the western Muri Mountains is known as the ‘Wurkun”. This common designation is Jukun in origin and simply means ‘people of the hills”. Its use predates colonialism and was first recorded in 1855 by members of the Niger-Benue Expedition. Like other such terms originated by outsiders, it came to be accepted by many to whom it was applied. The Piya, Kulung, Kwanci, and Kode, although speakers of largely distinct languages, identify themselves as Wurkun. However, although the differences, there is a clear indication of historical ties and local migrations. Hence, despite its external origin and the diversity of the languages used, this common “Wurkun” identity does have some historic basis in shared cultural features and social interactions.

Kundul

The wooden columnar figures of the Wurkun are called kundul. Besides this generic designation, individual sculptures often have personal names. Figures sometimes occur in male-female pairs: the male being distinguished from the female by a crest on its head. Such features atop the heads of male sculptures need not represent coiffures but may be modeled after the variety of helmets or headdresses worn by men on ceremonial occasions, or during dances, or in warfare. These figures may further be adorned with plant fibers, a nose peg, or a necklace.

The distinctive features of kundul sculpture include the elongation of the body, lozenge-shaped arms, accentuated umbilicus, absence of legs, and the specific method of their iron mounting. The stylization of arms pursues what is a tendency toward abstraction elsewhere in the region to an elegant extreme. The best kundul figures have shoulders, arms, and hands that connect as a single raised ridge forming a diamond or, with the angles of the elbows softened, an oval shape, which encircles the front of the torso – as if a letter “O” has been flattened against the figure’s middle. The necks of the figures are elongated and can be encircled with fiber. Kundul vary considerably in style, which is strikingly evident in the depictions of their faces, which range from naturalistic to abstract, with outlined ears and/or indications of coiffure and headdress. The incisions on the upper or lower jaw of some figures, most probably representing filed teeth, are a feature only found with statues from the northern range of the Muri Mountains, where the Pero and northern Piya peoples live. In the traditional bodily cicatrization practiced by the peoples of the Muri Mountains, the navel is emphasized through the use of patterns made around it. The umbilicus on the kundul seem to signify both humanity and connection to the ancestral/spiritual world. The figures may thus be seen as part of a chain than links forebears and offspring, the domain of the living and the domain of the departed.

Kundul are produced by carvers who are often blacksmiths – as can be anticipated given the presence of the iron spikes in their base. Typically, they are made on the directive of a priest who will tell a person seeking his help to procure such a sculpture for further use in ritual treatment. These anthropomorphic sculptures are used in a variety of rituals, usually concerned with healing and well-being. For instance, they may be commissioned after a breech birth has taken place or when someone has fallen ill, or they may serve as a protective device when a hunter is haunted by the spirit of an animal he has killed. A kundul gains its powers only after appropriate rituals and sacrifices have been made to give it life and power. For instance, a person suffering from disease will visit a healer who may instruct him to procure a pair of these figures as a component of the treatment. The kundul will be sprinkled with the blood of a sacrificed chicken and with millet beer. A pot may be placed beside the kundul to receive regular beer offerings. Offerings should be repeated annually after harvest, when the first fruits of the new crop are sacrificed to the figures. At this time, the kundul are brought out of the house and washed with a solution of water and brown or red clay. Afterward they are polished with oil made from guna seeds (Cucumis melo), and they are fed beer and porridge made from the new millet. The present statue shows clear signs of such a prolonged ritual use, with clear signs of the red clay solution to the ears.

The Master of Lunga

Research and photographic documentation show that kundul were widely used

prior to the 1970s. The American scholar Arnold Rubin undertook extensive

fieldwork in the region in the 1960s and photographed a group of such columnar

figures in a compound in Lunga, a Piya village in the northwestern part of the

Muri Mountains on January 10th, 1966. Central on this picture we find a kundul

pair (statues no. 5 and 6 from the left) that are clearly sculpted by the same

artist who created the present statue. The third statue from the right is another

statue by the same master carver, hence dubbed “The Master of Lunga”. Three other figures in private collections can be attributed to this artist (one sold at Sotheby's, New York, 16 May 1985. Lot 144; another at Galerie Wolfgang Ketterer, Munich, 6 May 1978. Lot 353; and the third at Bonhams, New York, "The Gelbard Collection of African Art", 13 November 2007. Lot 2538.).