The Rubens Room is an interior in the Picture Gallery of the New Hermitage - the Imperial Museum constructed to the design of Leo von Klenze in the mid-19th century. The décor of the room is focused on the ceiling while the monochrome walls are left plain for pictures to be displayed on them. The room shows works by Peter Paul Rubens, the head of the Flemish school of the 17th century. The Hermitage's collection of his works includes 22 paintings and 19 sketches covering all the periods of the great master's creative activities. Among his most famous canvases one should mention The Descent from the Cross (1617-18), The Union of Earth and Water (1618) and Carters (c. 1620). No less famous are other masterpieces in the Hermitage collection such as Perseus and Andromeda (early1620s), Bacchus (1636-40) or Portrait of a Chambermaid (mid-1620s).