China News Service, Beijing, September 25 (Reporter Du Yan) In the golden autumn of September, the lanterns on the Liangma River are starting to turn on, and the moon is getting fuller. The 2026 Beijing Chaoyang International Lighting Consumption Season and the 2026 Liangma River International Art Season kicked off at the Shell Theater in Chaoyang Park. For the first time, this event spans the Mid-Autumn Festival and National Day, creating an immersive light and shadow art scene.
The 2026 Beijing Chaoyang International Lighting Consumption Season builds a pattern of "two-core leadership, multi-point linkage, and global resonance", with the Liangma River Cultural Economic Zone and the Olympic Central District as the two core carrying areas, linking the CBD Business District, Sanlitun Business District, Chaowai UIC Street, Dawangjing Business District, Gaobeidian and other areas, relying on Chaoyang District's international resource advantages to activate new drivers of urban nighttime consumption. In Chaoyang Park, you can see the CBD city skyline in the south, the lights of the Dawangjing business district in the north, the Blue Harbor business district in the west, and the Liangma River that passes through the park. The international lighting installations in Taikoo Li Sanlitun, the Olympic Central District and the Orson Park staged the "four shows" of mountains, water, towers, and axes, and multiple light and shadow scenes complement each other.
This lighting consumption season creates a two-way tour experience on land and water: on the water, you can take the Liangma River Cruise to "Chase the Light" to watch the light and shadow performances of Lotus Lake and Beihu. On land, you can watch the performances along the night tour route of Chaoyang Park. The plot is integrated into the walk, and the waterfront is linked and connected between day and night, allowing citizens and tourists to experience the Chaoyang night from different perspectives.
The waterfront is the stage, and art is the scenery. This lighting consumption season's "Love of Light and Shadow" light and shadow night tour performance will start on the evening of the 24th. The event teamed up with China Oriental Performing Arts Group and other teams to launch the first large-scale traveling light and shadow night tour project "Light and Shadow" in Liangma River, turning Chaoyang Park into a three-dimensional light and shadow theater. Taking "running for an unexpected romance" as the core narrative clue, it is divided into three acts and seven chapters, using imagery to lead the audience "into a love poem of light and shadow being written." Seven themed theaters are scattered in Chaoyang Park in diverse scenes such as mechanical installations, water cruises, and floating stages, creating a night tour product of "one river and seven realms, traveling on land and water". The audience can watch while walking, immersed in it, and become the protagonist of the city's light and shadow story.
The overall performance breaks through a single stage carrier and achieves multi-dimensional three-dimensional presentation: the Qionglu Theater uses the light and shadow of the dome as the curtain to perform the classic excerpt "Caisson" from the dance drama "Yongle Weiyang". This is also the first outdoor offline performance of this dance segment. The dancers use their limbs to reproduce the ancient architectural structure of the interlocking brackets. The dragon pattern moves on the dome with the light and shadow, allowing the thousand-year architectural aesthetics to be resurrected three-dimensionally in the night. The magnificent artistic conception pave the way for the poetic background of the first encounter between the hero and heroine. The Encounter Theater relies on industrial ruins and uses mechanical dynamic light and shadow combined with modern dance to interpret the subtle emotional changes of slowly approaching and feeling good. The Bloom Theater uses the red wall of the building as its canvas, and the light and shadow are smeared upward layer by layer with the rhythm of the Spanish flamenco dancers. The passionate and unrestrained dance vividly displays the state of gradually brightening the mind and warming up the feelings.
The Light Chasing Theater is located in the natural waters of Lotus Lake. With a semicircular light and shadow water curtain as the background, it creates an elegant gathering of Chinese music on the water. The light and shadow work of "Wind Into the Lotus" flows with the water waves, telling the story of the hero and heroine's heartbeat from the first meeting, which slowly settles into a deep mutual understanding and understanding. The Xinyu Theater is located in the Bengbengyun Leisure Area. It performs musical duets between men and women, expressing their romantic expectations and affectionate ties from afar. On the North Lake, the 13.5-meter giant Rubik's Cube installation creatively designed by the internationally renowned director Richard Taylor is in the same frame as Beijing's most beautiful skyline. As Beijing's first floating light and shadow stage on the water, it is linked to a double-decker yacht-style cruise ship to jointly perform the dance "The Book of Ink and Ink". It spreads oriental aesthetics three-dimensionally on the water, and also symbolizes that the emotions between the two have faded away from ignorance and implicitness, and become clear and determined.
As the final chapter of the tour, the Shell Theater is Beijing's first new water-based outdoor immersive performance space. The dance "Heart Has a Echo" integrates the oriental aesthetics of "harmony between man and nature" into the night on the waterfront, and the whole romantic story slowly comes to an end. Leave a gentle and affectionate feeling on the water bank at night, with a long aftertaste that echoes for a long time. The AI short drama "Love of Light and Shadow" of the same name will be launched on Douyin, Hongguo and other platforms during the event, realizing a two-line linkage of "online drama chasing and offline chasing light". Citizens and tourists can check the performance time and obtain the night tour route map through the "Chaoyang Cultural Tourism Life" applet.
This lighting consumption season adheres to the two-way empowerment of national trends and international perspectives, allowing Chinese and foreign art to dialogue and coexist in the morning sun, and build an open and inclusive waterfront cultural living room. This lighting consumption season is linked to the Liangma River International Art Season, bringing together high-quality art content from around the world: the French creative team brings a floating piano and double bass duo to add a French romance to the Liangma River; the Latin American Art Season invites art troupes from six countries including Mexico, Colombia, and Chile to perform together. Bringing a cultural dialogue across the Pacific; balloon art masters from the Netherlands and France bring a balloon performance in Edinburgh, integrating balloon shaping technology into the narrative through physical comedy, impromptu interaction, and magic segments, sometimes humorous and sometimes dreamy; the giant light and shadow installation "Arch" created by a French artist "Flower (Flower of the Arch)" landed in Chaoyang Park and is the core art installation of this lighting consumption season. It is shaped like a slowly blooming giant flower and has become a romantic check-in node connecting art and citizens.
During the lighting consumption season, the Shell Theater also staged more than ten high-quality performances such as Yang Liping's team's "Image of Yunnan" outdoor waterfront exclusive version, ZaZaZsu band's retro jazz music night, and the Beijing International Music Festival Youth Orchestra performance. The ancient charm and national style complement each other with international art, and continue to polish the international cultural brand of "sharing the sunrise with the world".
Continuing the core concept of "Lighting +", this consumer season integrates diverse elements such as art, music, sports, food, and trendy commerce to create a full-scale urban consumption scene and realize the integration of light and shadow viewing, leisure play, and consumer experience.
In addition, during the Mid-Autumn Festival and National Day, Chaoyang District in Beijing will launch more than 100 cultural, business, tourism and sports exhibition linkage activities to promote the iterative upgrade of "performance, art, food, business, and conferences" scenes, and provide citizens and tourists with a spectacular, travelable, and playable urban light and shadow feast. Among them, key business districts and blocks have simultaneously upgraded their consumer experience. The "READYGO Urban Playground" mode has been launched in the Chaowai UIC neighborhood, and the nationwide exclusive "Batman Day" theme event has been launched. The limited-time "DC Good Things Club" will last until October 18; pop-ups linked to the concerts of Zhou Shen, Mao Buyi and others, and Stray Kids official pop-up SKZOO will take turns.
