The Virgin is shown in half-length holding the Christ-child in her arms. She is dressed in a red maphorion (decorated with gold bands) with a blue chiton. She gazes at Christ. Christ is wearing a red himation over a white chiton with a blue pattern. He holds a book in his right hand. The iconography is known as Eleousa as it characterises the tenderness between the Mother of God and Christ. Both figures set against a blue background, with gold leaf halos.

The Ionian islands, together with the island of Crete, passed to the Venetian Empire at the time of the Crusader attack on Constantinople in 1204. The final fall of Constantinople to the Ottoman Empire in 1453 saw the relocation byzantine painters to Crete and the establishment of the Cretan School, often referred to as the Veneto-Cretan School, and the large-scale production of Byzantine style Madonna paintings for the Venetian market. The fall of Crete to the Turks in 1646 saw the transfer of this activity to the Ionian Islands where Greek Orthodox culture still thrived under Venetian rule. Our icon is a happy example of the fusion of traditional Byzantine formality with the bravura of Venetian Rococo mannerism.