A PORTRAIT OF DURGAMAHISHASURAMARDINI Possibly Calcutta (Kolkata), Bengal school, Eastern India, late 19th century Opaque pigments heightened with gold on paper, the vertical composition depicting a multi-armed Durga Mahishasuramardini (slayer of the Buffalo Demon) wearing a caparisoned red and gold outfit, heavily bejewelled and with an encrusted crown with a halo symbolising her divine nature, her hands holding a bow and arrow, trisula, club, dagger, sword and the green buffalo demon by the hair, the headless buffalo corpse laying to the feet of the goddess and attacked by a crowned white lion, possibly the painter’s personal reinterpretation of the tiger normally portrayed in this scene, the goddess flanked by a blue-skinned Krishna on the left standing on a lotus holding a sitar and Radha on the right, the scene set within rust coloured borders and mounted on a grey cardboard mount, 38cm x 29cm, 48cm x 39.5cm including the mount.