Alexandre Cabanel (September 28, 1823 - January 23, 1889) was a painter born in Montpellier, France. He painted historical, classical and religious subjects. He was also well-known as a portrait painter.
Cabanel was elected a member of the Institut 1863 and appointed professor at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in the same year.
Cabanel won the Grande Médaille d’Honneur at the Salons of 1865, 1867 and 1878.
He was closely connected to the Paris Salon: “He was elected regularly to the Salon jury and his pupils could be counted by the hundred at the Salons. Through them, Cabanel did more than any other artist of his generation to form the character of belle époque French painting” (Dictionary of Art (1996) vol 5 pp 341-344).
Cabanel’s Portrait of Madame Keller and The Birth of Venus can be seen in the Musée d’Orsay in Paris.
Several of his works are owned by the United States.