Ernest Slingeneyer

Ernest Slingeneyer, Ernest Isidore Hubert Slingeneyer or Ernst Slingeneyer was a Belgian painter of history paintings, portraits, genre scenes and the occasional landscape. Slingeneyer is regarded as one of the last representatives of Romanticism in Belgian painting and of Academism in Romanticism in Belgian art. In his later career he was one of the leading representatives of Orientalism in Belgium. An excellent portraitist, Slingeneyer made portraits of historical figures as well as of well-known figures from his time. Slingeneyer was also a politician and was a member of the Belgian Chamber of Representatives for the Independists of Brussels, a coalition of personalities bound by their opposition to the Radicalist liberals. As a politician he promoted Academic art and agitated against new artistic currents as promoted by, amongst others, the Société Libre des Beaux-Arts in Brussels.