Sir Alfred James Munnings, KCVO Kt PRA RI (8 October 1878 – 17 July 1959) is known as having been one of England's finest painters of horses, and as an outspoken critic of Modernism.

The loss of sight in his right eye in an accident in 1898 did not deflect his determination to paint, and in 1899 two of his pictures were shown at the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition.

Although his second wife encouraged him to accept commissions from society figures, Munnings became best known for his equine painting: he often depicted horses participating in hunting and racing.

In 1917, his participation in the war was limited to a civilian job outside Reading, processing tens of thousands of Canadian horses en route to France — and often to death.

During the war he painted many scenes, including in 1918 a portrait of General Jack Seely mounted on his horse Warrior (now in the collection of the National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa).

[10] After what is known as "the last great cavalry charge" at the Battle of Moreuil Wood, Gordon Flowerdew was posthumously awarded the Victoria Cross for leading Lord Strathcona's Horse in a successful engagement with entrenched German forces.

[11] The Canadian Forestry Corps invited Munnings to tour its work camps in France, and in 1918 he produced drawings, watercolors, and oil paintings, including Draft Horses, Lumber Mill in the Forest of Dreux.

In 1950, Munnings, through a ruse, got hold of some of Stanley Spencer's Scrapbook Drawings and initiated an unsuccessful police prosecution against him for obscenity.

Sir Gerald Kelly, Munnings' successor as president of the Royal Academy, intervened with the police on Spencer's behalf.

As of 2007[update], the highest price paid for a Munnings painting was $7,848,000 for The Red Prince Mare, far above his previous auction record of $4,292,500 set at Christie's in December 1999.