Painter Stefan Caltia will donate to the Brukenthal National Museum at the end of August a work created in 2025 and inspired by Anthony van Dyck's celebrated painting 'The Death of Cleopatra', which disappeared from the Sibiu institution's collection in 1968, museum manager Raluca Teodorescu told AGERPRES.

'At the close of master Caltia's exhibition, 'Transylvania - Extravaganza', the Brukenthal National Museum will receive a work created by the artist in 2025, carrying a symbolic message. In 1968, the Brukenthal National Museum lost eight paintings, including Van Dyck's 'The Death of Cleopatra'. Master Caltia shows us another 'Death of Cleopatra', reinterpreted in a modern manner, which he will donate to the museum at the end of August 2026,' Teodorescu said.

According to her, the donation will coincide with the closing of the 'Transylvania - Extravaganza' exhibition, organised as part of the Sibiu International Theatre Festival (FITS). Bringing together 130 works by Stefan Caltia, it is the artist's most representative exhibition to date and one of the cultural highlights of this year's edition.

The donated painting carries particular symbolic significance, representing a contemporary reinterpretation of 'The Death of Cleopatra', a work by Flemish painter Anthony van Dyck that was stolen from the Brukenthal Museum nearly six decades ago together with seven other paintings.

The exhibition can be visited until August 16 at the former Teacher Training School of the Ursuline Monastery.

'Bringing together 130 works created between 1970 and 2026, 105 of which are being shown to the public for the first time, the exhibition offers the most comprehensive journey so far into the world that Stefan Caltia has been observing and preserving for more than five decades,' a press release says.

Painter Stefan Caltia is to be decorated by President Nicusor Dan with the National Order of the Star of Romania in the rank of Knight 'on the occasion of the opening of the 'Transylvania - Extravaganza' exhibition, his largest solo exhibition, in recognition of his exceptional contribution to promoting cultural heritage at local, national and universal level', according to the decree signed by the head of state.

Running from Friday until June 29, FITS will bring together more than 5,000 artists from 83 countries and include 848 events, eight more than at the previous edition, according to festival president and actor Constantin Chiriac.

AGERPRES National News Agency is a media partner of FITS. AGERPRES (RO - writing by: Isabela Paulescu; EN - writing by: Simona Iacob)

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