Jean-François Portaels or Jan Portaels was a Belgian painter of genre scenes, biblical stories, landscapes, portraits and orientalist subjects.
He was also a teacher and director of the Academy of Fine Arts of Ghent and the Académie Royale des Beaux-Arts in Brussels.
He is regarded as the founder of the Belgian Orientalist school.
He was praised in his time as the premier painter of 'everyday elegance and feminine grace'.