The State Hermitage Museum launches a new direction of virtual visits — "Empty frames: enter the picture"

A virtual tour, which is fundamentally different from all previous ones, has appeared on the Hermitage’s website. For the first time ever, viewers can get a behind-the-scenes look at how museum masterpieces are restored. The debut virtual display of the project “Empty Frames: Step into the Painting” features Bacchus by Peter Paul Rubens.

For over a year, the large-scale canvas depicting the ancient god of wine has been in the Laboratory for the Scientific Restoration of Easel Paintings. The painting will not be unveiled to the public again until 2027, at an exhibition marking Rubens’s 450th anniversary. This virtual visit maintains access to the world masterpiece from anywhere on the globe, while offering a rare look at the work of top-tier restorers. They are currently cleaning the painting of old varnishes and later overpaintings, restoring it to the artist’s original color palette.

For the project, high-resolution spherical panoramas were captured in the Rubens Hall and the Laboratory for the Scientific Restoration of Easel Paintings. These allow viewers to examine Bacchus both in its traditional place within the exposition and on the restorer’s workbench. In the laboratory, interactive markers provide a closer look at the specialized tools used by Hermitage experts.

The virtual tour is accompanied by commentary from Maria Shulepova, an artist-restorer of the highest category, and Vladislav Statkevich, a Keeper of the Hermitage’s Flemish painting. A mini-documentary dedicated to the restoration of Bacchus further complements the virtual exhibition.

The virtual visit can be accessed by this direct link or through the Virtual Visit section of the museum website.

The “Empty frames: enter the picture” project will be updated with new virtual visits documenting the restoration of further works from the Hermitage’s holdings.