"So far, we have not received an official confirmation that The Entombment painting is an original. Moreover, the Hermitage has sent us a letter requesting additional examination of the painting," Karpov said, adding that the presentation of the Rubens painting planned for September is postponed indefinitely.

YEKATERINBURG, August 5. /TASS/. The Entombment, a painting by Flemish artist Peter Rubens previously kept at the Irbit Museum of Fine Arts (Sverdlovsk Region) and considered a copy of the original, will undergo additional examination at the Hermitage Museum, head of the Irbit museum Valery Karpov told TASS on Monday.

According to the head of the Irbit Museum, experts from the Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts may also join the examination team. The date of the examination has not been set yet.

The copy of the Position in a Coffin painting was delivered to the Irbit Museum in 1976 from the Hermitage Museum. According to Karpov, during restoration works held in 2016-2017, local experts began to suspect that the painting is an original. Later, the museum received an oral confirmation from the Hermitage experts that the Rubens painting is indeed an original, the head of the museum informed.

Another work by Rubens, The Repentant Mary Magdalene and her sister Martha, kept at the same museum, was discovered to be an original back in 2012. Both paintings are ensured for hundreds millions of euros, Karpov assured.