In creating portraits for oil light paintings, painters usually take sketches in the opera theatre. In order to attract more customers, painters do everything to make innovations, such as adding blessings and lantern riddles .

The subjects of Wuqiang New Year painting come from many sources. Some paintings depict good harvests and happy life, such as "A Good Harvest", "Heavy Snow Forecasts A Good Harvest", "Good Luck in the New Year", "Prosperity for Generations to Come" and "Blessing Baby Birth". Some depict warding off evils and  ghosts, such as"Zhongkui Conquering Ghosts", "Gate God" and "Tiger ". Some reflect daily life and teaches people to be kind and hardworking, such as "Busy Housewife", "Busy Farmers", "Happy Fishermen". There are also styles depicting legends, myths, history and opera stories, such as "Romance of the Three Kingdom", "Defeating the Heavenly Gate Formation", "the Legend of the White Snake" and "Lady Chang'er Heading for the Moon".

Apart from paintings for spring festival, there are also styles for other traditional holidays. During the dragon boat festival , people usually drink medicine wines and wear herbal bags to ward off evils and poisonous insects. They also buy New Year paintings with contents related to conquering evils and ghosts to offer blessings for families.

Many old Wuqiang New Year paintings have been destroyed and lost because of wars and disasters. During the first and second world wars, some valuable pieces were lost overseas and now they are collected in foreign museums such as British Museum in London, Oriental Arts Museum in the former Soviet Union, San Francisco Museum in USA and Tokyo Museum in Japan. In order to better protect and collect masterpieces of Wuqiang New Year painting, the country's first museum for New Year painting was set up in 1985 and a society for the study of woodprint New Year painting was established.

In recent years, the age-old art Wuqiang New Year painting has enjoyed unprecedented development. While maintaining the traditional woodprint and silk print techniques, new technologies have been applied to speed up standard, high quality production of paintings. It is believed that the new generation of Wuqiang New Year Painting artists will bring new life to this time-honored folk art with their creativity and skills.

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