He studied at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Antwerp, and during 1826 in Paris. The Romantic movement with its new ideas about art and politics was happening in France. Wappers was the first Belgian artist to use this form. His first painting, "The Devotion of the Burgomaster of Leiden," appeared at the right time. It had much success in the Brussels Salon during 1830, the year of the Belgian Revolution.