Gustaaf Wappers

GUSTAAF WAPPERS (Antwerp, Belgium, 1803- Paris, 1874).
"Portrait of a gentleman".
Oil on canvas.
Signed in the left central margin.
Relined. It has slight flaws in the lower margin.
Measurements: 70,5 x 59 cm.

In this canvas Wappers offers us a masculine portrait of romantic inheritance, of firm drawing, expressive and controlled, and softly nuanced chromatism, especially in the face, where he models the features with great efficiency. It is an energetic face, reflecting the personality of the sitter.

Gustaaf Wappers trained at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Antwerp and during 1826 in Paris. His romantic work "The Devotion of the Burgomaster of Leiden" achieved notable success at the Brussels Salon in 1830, the year of the Belgian Revolution. Louis Philippe I of France commissioned him to paint a large painting for the Versailles gallery. After retiring as director of the Antwerp Academy, he settled in Paris in 1853, considered one of the most talented examples of Romanticism in Belgium.