Saint Nicholas in Post-Byzantine Icon-painting. Maria Vassilaki (Thessaly, Greece)
A tripartite icon with the Virgin of the Passion on the central panel, Saint John the Theologian on the left and Saint Nicholas on the right, which is in the church of San Nicola in Bari offers the best introduction to this essay. This composite icon is attributed to the famous Cretan icon-painter Andreas Ritzos, active in the second half of the fifteenth century. The iconographic type of Saint Nicolas in this icon, in bust holding, a closed Gospel book in his left hand and blessing with his right, is common in Cretan icon-painting of the fifteenth century. Most of the surviving examples are either signed or attributed to Andreas Ritzos and this may indicate that we could credit this painter with the establishment and popularity of this specific iconographic type of the saint at least in Cretan icon painting.
Along with the representation of Saint Nicholas in bust, Cretan painters also developed the iconographic type of the full-length, standing Saint Nicholas. The earliest example is to be found in a polyptych, which was commissioned in Crete for the altar of the church of San Stefano in Monopoli, Apulia but now belongs to the Boston Museum of Fine Arts. The full-length, standing Saint Nicholas also appears in an icon of monumental dimensions from a private collection in Kerkyra, which bears the signature of the Cretan painter Angelos, that is Angelos Akotantos, active in the second quarter of the fifteenth century. Cretan icon-painters also developed the iconographic type of Saint Nicholas enthroned, as surviving examples indicate.
All three iconographic types of Saint Nicholas (in bust, full-length standing and enthroned) will become the standard representation of the saint in the central panel of his biographical icons, which will make their appearance in Cretan icon-painting from the first decades of the fifteenth century and will continue in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. The scenes from the saint's life are usually placed on all four sides of his icons.
The vast number of surviving representations of Saint Nicholas in Cretan icon-painting can clearly show the popularity of Saint Nicholas on the island of Crete. It is not difficult to understand why Saint Nicholas was so popular in an island whose inhabitants had a strong naval activity. This activity of the native Cretans was further reinforced after the arrival of the Venetians on the island in 1210 and especially from the fourteenth century onwards.
Outside Crete, the production of Post-Byzantine icons of Saint Nicholas was greatly influenced by the iconography and scheme of Cretan icons. In the Ionian Islands painters of Cretan origin transported the Cretan iconography of the biographical icons of Saint Nicholas. The icons of Saint Nicholas, in all the iconographic types and schemes, continued to be very popular in the icon painting of the 18th and 19th c., which is a clear evidence of the popularity of the saint in Greece even to this day.