THE HINDU GOD OF DESTRUCTION, SHIVA
Pre-Kalighat style, Calcutta (Kolkata), West Bengal, North-Eastern India, ca. 1820 - 1830

Black ink and pencil on wove paper, the vertical portrait depicting Lord Shiva with four arms, holding in each hand a different attribute like a noose, a trident (trisula), a dagger and a sword, around his chest a necklace of skulls, his forehead marked with the typical tripundra, the three horizontal lines of Shaivite believers, his hair tied in a bun by a snake, the iconography in line with tantric images of the deity, mounted, glazed and framed, the folio 24.7cm x 20cm.