Five rare Byzantine icons who fled from Kiev are included in a collection that will be exhibited from tomorrow Wednesday at the Louvre Museum in Paris.

The images are part of a collection of 16 artworks from the Bogdan & Varvara Khanenko Art Museum that fled Kiev last May amid the Russian invasion. They were transported to France via Poland and Germany.

Four paintings come from the monastery of Saint Catherine, on Mount Sinai in Egypt, and date between the 6th and 7th centuries AD. The fifth, depicting Saint Nicholas, comes from Constantinople and dates between the 13th and 14th centuries.

Ukraine’s Minister of Culture Oleksandr Tkachenko denounced the Russian invaders for theft of works of art and destruction of monuments of cultural heritage. He also expressed concern over the flooding caused by the recent collapse of the Kakhovka dam, noting that thousands of works of art had taken refuge in the wider area from various parts of Ukrainian territory.

In October 2022, the Kyiv Art Museum was damaged by a Russian missile that landed nearby.

The exhibition at the Louvre Museum entitled “The Beginnings of Hagiography: Images from the Bogdan & Varvara Khanenko National Museum of Art, Kyiv” will run until November 6.