Gustav Wappers

1803 – 1874

Born 23 Aug 1803, Antwerpen – Died 6 Dec 1874, Paris

Egide Charles Gustave, Baron Wappers, was principally a painter of historical and genre subjects. Gustave Wappers studied at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Antwerp and continued his studies in Paris at the time of the Romantic Movement. His “The Devotion of the Burgomaster of Leiden” was successfully exhibited at the Salon of Brussels in 1830.
Having trained under Willem Jacob Herreyns (1743-1827) and Mattheus Ignatius van Bree (1773-1839) at Antwerp Academy, Wappers studied the works of the Dutch masters in Holland and that of the Italians in Paris. After Matthieu-Ignace Van Brée died in 1839 Wappers succeeded him as director of the Academy in Antwerp. Among his pupils were Ford Madox Brown, Lawrence Alma-Tadema and Ludwig von Hagn.
A representative of romanticism, Wappers was made Principal Painter to King Leopold I in 1845.

Commissioned by King Louis-Philippe of France he painted “The Defence of Rhodes by the Knights of St John of Jerusalem” (1844) for the gallery at Versailles. In 1844 he was knighted by Leopold I. After he retired from his directorship in Antwerp he settled in Paris in 1853. There he died in 1874.