Icon. Akhtyrka Most Holy Mother of God"

The icon shows a half-length image of the Mother of God in a three-quarter turn to the right, with smooth dark hair falling to her shoulders; around her head is an applied radiant halo. The Mother of God wears a bordered tunic and maphorion, her hands folded in a gesture of prayer at chest level; her gaze and a slight tilt of her head are directed toward the Crucifixion, shown in the lower right corner.

The icon is executed in gesso applied over the panel, leaving the "flesh" areas — the faces of the Mother of God and Christ — as painted.

The icon's frame is ornamented with a garland of acanthus leaves, underscored on one side by a dotted border.

In the lower part of the icon, a rectangular plaque is set into the frame bearing a Church Slavonic inscription divided by a round medallion: "A DEPICTION OF MIRACLES ON THE FEAST OF THE ICON OF THE MOST HOLY MOTHER OF GOD OF AKHTYRKA, [WHICH] CAME TO PASS ON JUNE 2, 1739..." (the medallion is lost).

The reverse of the icon panel is reinforced with a horizontal inset batten.

The icon was acquired by the museum from A. M. Bortnikova of Kharkiv in 1973.

Legend: the iconography of the Akhtyrka Icon shows signs of Western European influence, in particular Italo-Greek models and 18th-century Baroque style. Its unique, atypical iconography combines Eastern and Western traditions. The history of the Akhtyrka Icon of the Mother of God begins with its miraculous appearance on July 2, 1739, to Vasyl Danylov, priest of the Church of the Protection in the town of Akhtyrka, during haymaking. In 1751 the Synod officially recognized the Akhtyrka Icon as miracle-working and confirmed its status in church tradition. After this official recognition, many copies of the icon were made. It was especially widely venerated in the Sloboda Ukraine region. A tragic episode in the icon's history was its theft in 1903 from Akhtyrka's Protection Cathedral.

The revival of prayerful veneration of this image began in 1995, when Metropolitan Nikodim of Kharkiv and Bohodukhiv brought a copy of it to the Protection Cathedral in Akhtyrka.

The Akhtyrka Icon of the Mother of God is invoked by mothers anxious for the lives of their children, as well as by orphans who have not known a mother's love, and by all the poor and destitute.