Mattheus Ignatius van Bree

He participated that year in the Paris Salon and won second prize in the Prix de Rome with his painting The death of Cato in Utica.

From 1801 he undertook some important commissions, for example The Arrival of the First Consul Napoleon Bonaparte at Antwerp, 18 June 1803, painted for Josephine de Beauharnais.

During the period of French rule he executed historical subjects and portraits in a stark neo-classical style owing much to both David and Vincent.

[2] He trained some of the eminent painters of the next generation such as Egide Charles Gustave Wappers, Nicaise de Keyser, Jan August Hendrik Leys, Antoine Wiertz, Jules Victor Génisson and Ferdinand de Braekeleer the Elder in whom he instilled his admiration for the masters of the Flemish school, and in particular, Rubens and van Dyck.

[1] Among his most important works are The Patriotism of the Burgomaster Van der Werft, in the city hall of Leyden, and The Death of Rubens, in the Royal Museum of Fine Arts, Antwerp.