Fabienne Verdier

Fabienne Verdier spent 10 years in China in 1980s learning Chinese painting when she was 20 years old. Verdier graduated from the Ecole des Beaux-Arts of Toulouse in 1983 while studying Chinese at the Institut des Langues et Civilisation Orientales in Paris when she received a scholarship, but turned it down and requested to be placed in an art school in China to learn traditional Chinese painting. And by chance, Toulouse and Chongqing signed an agreement that linked them together and Verdier became the first exchange student between the two cities.