LIU Qixiang - 劉啟祥 (1910-1998) Bouquet of flowers in a blue vase, 1945Oil on canvas. Signed and dated lower right. 46 x 33 cmBorn in Taiwan, Liu left his country in 1923 to study in Japan and in 1928 joined the Kawabata Academy of Painting in Tokyo . He stayed in Paris and discovered European painting with other Taiwanese artists between 1932 and 1935, then returned to Japan and returned to Taiwan in 1946. In 1952, he founded the Kaohsiung Art Research Association (KARA) with other Taiwanese artists, whose objective was to promote international artistic concepts and painting styles such as Impressionism, Post-Impressionism, Fauvism and Avant-Gardism.