Lincoln Center's Summer for the City to Feature Chinese Arts Week Programming

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Events will feature the North American premiere of her new work, The Ocean Etched in the Forest, Shen Wei Dance Arts and more.

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This July, Lincoln Center will shine a spotlight on the rich cultural artistry of China with a week-long showcase of programs highlighting the depth and diversity of Chinese culture from July 22-26. As a part of their Summer for the City festival, Chinese Arts Week showcases the country’s creative excellence.

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Theater Storytime With Grace Chang Karen and Richard LeFrak Lobby, David Geffen Hall FREE Presented in collaboration with The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts Acclaimed author and performer Grace Chang offers a children’s Storytime reading of her book Jin Jin the Dragon, illustrated by Chong Chang. Brought to life with puppetry and magic, the story follows Jin Jin, a newly hatched dragon on a quest to discover what kind of creature he is. This charming parable of self-discovery is suitable for children wondering about their own identities and origins.

Shen Wei Dance Arts | Guangdong Modern Dance Company: MindScape Hearst Plaza FREE Part of the Pasculano Collaborative for Contemporary Dance As part of Chinese Arts Week and Dance Encounters, a new cross-cultural, cross-national, and cross-temporal work MindScape from choreographer Shen Wei features Shen Wei Dance Arts and Guangdong Modern Dance Company, co-commissioned by Lincoln Center and American Dance Festival. Combining contemporary dance with poetry, abstract calligraphy, and painting, the work explores the spiritual pursuit of inner harmony and transcendence, and how this ancient concept may be used in pursuit of a future "spiritual landscape," creating profound unity between humanity and nature.

Awakening Lion + Yingge Dance 南国醒狮 x 英歌 The Dance Floor at Josie Robertson Plaza FREE As part of the opening day's festivities for Lincoln Center's Chinese Arts Week, we present a performance of the millennia-old south China theater procession known as Xing Shi or the Awakening Lion (南国醒狮). The charismatic Awakening Lion hails originally from Guangdong, which is also the home of Yingge dance (英歌), a highly stylized and energetic folk dance that merges Chinese opera acrobatics, costuming and make-up with characters from classical novels such as White Snake and Water Margin. Both of these traditional arts will leap to life on The Dance Floor with the Awakening Lion Dance presented by Zhao Family Lion Dance Company, a UNESCO-recognized cultural heritage carrier, accompanied by the gravity-defying Fumei Youth Yingge Team from the town of Puning in Guangdong.

Living Music: Ian Chang David Rubenstein Atrium FREE Ian Chang is a virtuosic, genre-agnostic percussionist, composer, and producer who manipulates sound samples into a seamless synthesis of raw intensity and sophisticated sound design. Since joining eclectic trio Son Lux in 2014 and supporting artists such as Moses Sumney, Matthew Dear, and CHVRCHES, Chang’s debut 2020 full-length record, 属 Belonging, offered deeper insight into his unique and ever-evolving vision. Chang is an in-demand soundtrack artist who scored the 2022 Best Picture Oscar winner Everything Everywhere All at Once with Son Lux, for which the band was nominated for two Academy Awards and a BAFTA. Performing as part of both Chinese Arts Week and Nadia Sirota's Living Music program, Chang's Lincoln Center debut headlining set will feature selections from his earlier solo work and new projects in process.

Chinatown Records Block Party The Dance Floor at Josie Robertson Plaza FREE Summer for the City's Chinese Arts Week kicks off with a Chinatown Records (華埠錄音) block party, presented by special guest DJs yiuyiu (瑶瑶) and Alice Liu (劉凱儀). Chinatown Records is a homegrown collective and living archive of inherited music collections founded by mixmaster historian yiuyiu. Get ready to party with an explosive set of classic Cantopop and Mandopop hits and rarities, Chinatown style!

Shanghai Restoration Project and Tebza Majaivane Finding Bakoena in a SoJo Cloud The Dance Floor at Josie Robertson Plaza FREE Take a step on The Dance Floor for a one-night-only event featuring a live music performance and dance workshop by the electronic group Shanghai Restoration Project (SRP) and South African rapper Tebza Majaivane aka Tebza Diphehlo, national champion of Red Bull Dance Your Style. Blending field recordings of Chinese ethnic minority musicians in Yunnan with the South African electronic music style of amapiano, “Finding Baokena in a SoJo Cloud” is a cross-cultural magnet for electronic dance music lovers around the world. Come find your rhythm on The Dance Floor during Chinese Arts Week as you learn new steps to the beat of this thrilling collaboration.

About Face: Disrupting Ballet Film Screening David Rubenstein Atrium FREE Presented as part of Lincoln Center's Chinese Arts Week and China Institute's centennial celebration, About Face: Disrupting Ballet, a new feature-length documentary, spotlights the efforts of former New York City Ballet soloist Georgina Pazcoguin and author, producer, and choreographer Phil Chan as they launch their global Final Bow for Yellowface movement and challenge the dance world to rid ballet of long-standing Asian stereotypes. This vivid account of the growing pains of creative evolution reveals the tension and risks artists endure as they push classical artforms to more authentically reflect audiences today. After the screening, join us for a talk-back with the film's subjects and China Institute of America's Director of Programs, Susan Yuqing Feng. For a century, China Institute of America has been dedicated to deepening the world’s understanding of China.

The Ocean Etched in the Forest Alice Tully Hall CHOOSE-WHAT-YOU-PAY Lincoln Center presents a major work from the Pulitzer Prize-winning composer and performer Du Yun. Born in China and currently based in New York City, Du Yun’s insatiable curiosity finds new voice in The Ocean Etched in the Forest (刻在森林的海). Over the past several years, Du Yun and her collaborator Julian Crouch have worked closely with Jino artists from Yunnan province, including He Guiying, the national inheritor of his people's unique heritage. Living almost entirely isolated from urban society until 1979, the Jino people have maintained their distinct culture and ecologically grounded mindset amid rampant modernization. In collaboration with Du Yun and Crouch, Guiying has been recording Jino children from Bapiao Village as they perform nearly forgotten local folk songs. These recordings, merged with music from Du Yun’s band OK MISS and live theatrical elements, form Ocean’s original musical tapestry for a concert that transcends time and geography. Join us for a work that highlights the intersections of ancient tradition and modern methodology, folk tales and contemporary storytelling, and generations living and gone.

This performance is commissioned by Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts and the Beijing Music Festival. The world premiere of Ocean Etched in the Forest took place at the Beijing Music Festival, followed by the North American Premiere as part of the Lincoln Center Presents Summer for the City 2026.

Kung Fu Hip Hop 功夫街舞 The Dance Floor at Josie Robertson Plaza FREE From the moment popping, locking, and breaking entered into the world culture vocabulary, Hip-Hop dance and kung fu have been in a mutually respectful conversation. Both require years of training to perfect; and both place a high value on acrobatics, grace, and style. For this live performance as part of Lincoln Center's Chinese Arts Week, China-based dance squads versed in the vernacular language of both b-boy swag and martial arts rigor meet for a costumed dance showcase with performers dressed in both traditional Chinese cultural apparel and contemporary style. It’s a Hip-Hop battle and a high intensity sparring session; crews and lead dancers will be announced shortly.

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_Originally reported by [BroadwayWorld](https://www.broadwayworld.com/off-broadway/article/Programming-Set-for-Chinese-Arts-Week-Part-of-Lincoln-Centers-Summer-for-the-City-Festival-20260616)._