ISLAND Arts Centre celebrates Chinese New Year with landmark exhibition “Lu Xun’s Legacy: Printmaking in Modern China

February 23, 2026

With Chinese New Year celebrations underway this week, ISLAND Arts Centre in association with The Muban Educational Trust is delighted to host an exhibition of prestigious prints entitled Lu Xun’s Legacy: Printmaking in Modern China (19 February - 2 April). This is the first time that prints from The Muban Educational Trust have ever been shown in Northern Ireland and Ireland, marking another significant moment for ISLAND Arts Centre in its 25^th anniversary year.

The exhibition features prints from a selection of over six thousand held by The Muban Educational Trust. It is a celebration of the extraordinary range and versatility of style, technique and aesthetic expression in modern Chinese prints, featuring prints from every decade since The Modern Woodcut Movement, founded by Lu Xun in the 1930s.

At the exhibition launch on Wednesday 18 February, the curator Mary Ginsberg (art historian and visiting researcher at the British Museum), was joined by Muban Educational Trust’s Rebecca von der Burg (Chairperson) and Haiyao Zheng; Nancy Wang, Deputy Consul General of the People’s Republic of China in Belfast and Consul Hui Zuo; and Danny Wong, MBE, President of the Chinese Chamber of Commerce. The evening also marked Chinese Lunar New Year (Year of the Horse), with traditional Chinese dance, music and Kung Fu.

Vice Chair of Communities and Wellbeing for Lisburn & Castlereagh City Council, Councillor Alan Givan who was also in attendance said of the event, ‘this is a most inspirational and exciting exhibition that we are proud to host at ISLAND Arts Centre. The range of prints is not only impressively created but also tells many stories that will captivate all those who come to visit’.

The exhibition is on display until Thursday 2 April.