Brief Biography-Alexandre Cabanel was born in Montpellier, Southern France. He was a painter of academic learning. He focused on portraiture’s historical and religious content. He won the Prix de Rome in 1845 after studying at the École des Beaux-Arts since 1840. Napoleon III bought his painting The Birth of Venus in 1863, and he was a professor of the École des Beaux-Arts alongside Jean-Léon Gérôme in the same year. Cabanel was also awarded the Légion d’Honneur. One of his many students was Jules Bastien-Lepage, whose en plein air style displeased Cabanel, which he considered somewhat removed from academism.