Icon "Saint Nicholas the Wonderworker"

The icon shows a half-length, frontal image of Saint Nicholas the Wonderworker (Summer), with a high, open forehead, short gray hair, a mustache and a small beard. He wears episcopal vestments: a dark-blue phelonion and a red omophorion with golden crosses. His right hand is raised in blessing, his left holds the Gospel. Around his head is a round halo in the form of a thin yellow circle; to the left and right of the halo is the Church Slavonic inscription: "Saint Nicholas the Wonderworker." Above Nicholas's left and right shoulders, within circles, are images of Christ offering the Gospel and the Mother of God. Christ wears a tunic and himation, with a cruciform halo around his head; his right hand is raised in blessing. Above the circle enclosing the image of Christ is the inscription: "Jesus Christ." The Mother of God wears a maphorion, with a round halo around her head. Above the circle enclosing her image is the inscription: "Mother of God." The background of the icon is brown, with a dark-brown frame around its perimeter.

The icon is painted on a panel, reinforced with two inset end battens.

The icon was seized at the Boryspil customs post and entered the museum's holdings by decision of the State Customs Committee of Ukraine and the National Committee for the Return of Cultural Property to Ukraine under the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine in 1995.

Legend: in folk tradition, the name "Summer Nicholas" refers not so much to the time of an event as to a depiction of Nicholas without a mitre.

The tradition of venerating Saint Nicholas in the Ukrainian lands dates back to the official adoption of Christianity in Kyivan Rus.

Saint Nicholas the Wonderworker is invoked for help, for the protection of children, and for keeping families and fields safe from fire. He is the patron of travelers, sailors, farmers, beekeepers and children, and a protector of the poor, the sick, and the condemned.