Liu Haisu (16 March 1896–7 August 1994) was a prominent twentieth-century Chinese painter and a noted art educator. He excelled in Chinese painting and oil painting. He was one of the four pioneers of Chinese modern art who earned the title of "The Four Great Academy Presidents". Liu loved painting from a very young age and went to Shanghai for professional studying alone at 14. When he was 17, he established the first art school of modern China—Shanghai institute of Fine Art with his friends, Wu Shiguang and Zhang Jinguang. In 1918, he began teaching at Peking University and held his first solo exhibition. In the same year, he also founded the “Art” magazine. In 1919, he went to Japan to study painting and art education and attended the first art exhibition opening ceremony of the Art School of the imperial Japan. After returning home, he founded an institute Tian Ma Yun. In 1920, he went to Japan once again. He participated in the opening ceremony of the new imperial Art School on behalf of the arts. In 1924, one of his students held an exhibition in Nanchang featuring nude art. This greatly disturbed Sun Chuanfang, who issued a secret warrant for Liu's arrest and tried to close his school. However, his efforts were futile, since the school was based in the French area of Shanghai, where Sun had no authority. Liu still had to pay a fine to appease the warlord. The event made the concept of nude modeling public knowledge in China. In 1927, he was forced to go to Japan because of the political persecution. Asahi Shimbun once assisted him to hold solo exhibitions in Tokyo. In 1938, he went home.