The Shanghai School (海上画派 Haishang Huapai) is a style of Chinese art present in the late 19th century and centered in Shanghai. Late 19th century China, or the last years of the Qing dynasty formed a tumultuous time in China's history. This period immediately followed the defeat of China in the First Opium War by the British Empire and opened several ports, such as Shanghai, to foreign trade. This period was further destabilized by the Taiping rebellions and the unequal treaties propagated by the promulgated by European imperialists. Shanghai, as an open city, became a sort of Asian melting pot where the various European powers could freely express their influence on the city. In turn, this influence gave rise to a new middle class which supported a new style of art known as the Shanghai school.

The three hundred years of Chinese art history prior to the advent of the Shanghai School was dominated by the Literati style exemplified in the paintings of Shen Zhou in the 16th century. The Shanghai style marked the first major departure from traditionalist Chinese painting by focusing less on the symbolism emphasized by the Literati style and more on the visual content of the painting itself. The inspiration for this new style of painting came from 17th century eccentrics shunned by the Chinese art community at large and 18th Century Yangzhou style painters. However, the Shanghai school was characterized by its even greater form exaggeration and brighter colors. The Shanghai school was unable to gain significant traction against the traditional painting style because of greater Western Interest (and money) in the Literati tradition.

Shanghai is the largest city by population of the People's Republic of China (PRC) and the largest city proper by population in the world. It is one of the four province-level municipalities of the PRC, with a total population of over 23 million as of 2010. It is a global city, with influence in commerce, culture, finance, media, fashion, technology, and transport. It is a major financial center and the busiest container port in the world.

Located in the Yangtze River Delta in eastern China, Shanghai sits at the mouth of the Yangtze River in the middle portion of the Chinese coast. The municipality borders Jiangsu and Zhejiang Provinces to the west, and is bounded to the east by the East China Sea.

Once a fishing and textiles town, Shanghai grew in importance in the 19th century due to European recognition of its favorable port location and economic potential. The city was one of several opened to foreign trade following the British victory over China in the first opium war and the subsequent 1842 Treaty of Nanking which allowed the establishment of the Shanghai International Settlement. The city then flourished as a center of commerce between east and west, and became the undisputed financial hub of the Asia Pacific in the 1930s. However, with the Communist Party takeover of the mainland in 1949, the city's international influence declined. In the 1990s, the economic reforms introduced by Deng Xiaoping resulted in an intense re-development of the city, aiding the return of finance and foreign investment to the city.