Vintage Sandalwood Buddha Painting Photograph or Print

This image is believed to be of a painting which depicts the Sandalwood Buddha, or Udayana Buddha, a statue carved out of red sandalwood reputed to be a lifelike representation of Buddha Shakyamuni (post-enlightenment Buddha). The statue was the first image said to be made of the Buddha during his lifetime, commissioned by King Udayana of Kosala. 
 
The sculpture was reportedly kept in West India for over 1280 years before being moved to Kucha, and later China, where it drew pilgrims from Tibet, Mongolia and India. It was kept in the Zhantansi monastery in Beijing, China, under Tibetan Buddhist supervision, and it is uncertain where it ended up after the monastery was destroyed by fire during the Boxer Rebellion in 1900. Some say it was looted by Russians, others that it was destroyed in the fire, yet others suggest it was preserved in the Imperial Palace.
 
The only image of this found online was in an academic journal.
 
It is a high quality photograph with only a couple of creases in on the very edges of the paper. There is a Chinese embossed watermark or stamp in the lower left corner, which is a bit torn. We were not able to translate it. We suspect our great grand aunts, the Burr sisters, would have acquired this during a trip to China in the 1920s or 1930s. Then again, it seems one of them wrote on the back ‘Buddha new Kioto’, a possible reference to finding this in Kyoto, Japan…
 
H 11 1/4” x L 7 3/8”
 
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