Chinese New Year Celebrated with Shen Yun in Los Angeles

Two executives of Russian descent came to see Shen Yun Performing Arts on Feb. 13, the eve of the Lunar New Year.
Chinese New Year Celebrated with Shen Yun in Los Angeles
Audience at Shen Yun Performing Arts on Feb. 13, the eve of the Lunar New Year. (Alex Li/The Epoch Times)
Mary Silver
2/14/2010
Updated:
10/1/2015
<a><img src="https://www.theepochtimes.com/assets/uploads/2015/09/1__DSC5659.jpg" alt="Audience at Shen Yun Performing Arts on Feb. 13, the eve of the Lunar New Year. (Alex Li/The Epoch Times)" title="Audience at Shen Yun Performing Arts on Feb. 13, the eve of the Lunar New Year. (Alex Li/The Epoch Times)" width="320" class="size-medium wp-image-1823076"/></a>
Audience at Shen Yun Performing Arts on Feb. 13, the eve of the Lunar New Year. (Alex Li/The Epoch Times)
LOS ANGELES—Two executives of Russian descent came to see Shen Yun Performing Arts on Feb. 13, the eve of the Lunar New Year. Robert Polisky is an attorney and vice president of a health care company. Tatiana Khanina is a manager with a financial company.

Mr. Polisky said he would encourage others to see the performance: “Absolutely! It’s a nice cultural experience. It’s out-of-the-ordinary. ... You’re listening and you’re seeing—it’s nourishing for the soul.”

“We like the little cupids, the archery. We both were overcome, we were hit,” said Mr. Polisky. He was referring to the dance, Imperial Archers, which represents not the Greek love gods of Valentine’s Day, but warriors. Archery was a valued skill of Confucian learning in ancient China. The archers’ dance is energetic and taut, with a male ensemble in yellow and blue.

Ms. Khanina said she “fell in love with Chinese songs” while playing piano on a cruise on the Yangtze River. She said the music of Shen Yun felt authentic and contained “Chinese songs that I love, and they’re just absolutely gorgeous.” She likes to play Chinese music on her piano.

For the dance, Mr. Polisky was pleased by the choreography and the narrative component. He said, “The movement, how everybody seems in sync but doing their own thing, but coming together, and the dance in front of the background, with the stories, the traditional Chinese stories, the history—it’s very nice.”

“I totally agree,” Ms. Khanina said.

Mr. Polisky had not seen such a performance before: “I like it. This is actually the first time that I remember seeing a dance performance, and it’s actually very beautiful—the colors, the movement, the costumes—very romantic.”

The experience left him feeling that Chinese culture is universal: “We’re one world,” he said.

“I love it! It’s fabulous,” Ms. Khanina said.

Shen Yun Performing Arts Touring Company opened its first show of the Chinese Lunar New Year at Radio City Music Hall in New York on Feb. 13. Shen Yun will perform at Radio City Music Hall again on Feb. 20 and Feb. 21.

  For more information, please visit ShenYunPerformingArts.org
Mary Silver writes columns, grows herbs, hikes, and admires the sky. She likes critters, and thinks the best part of being a journalist is learning new stuff all the time. She has a Masters from Emory University, serves on the board of the Georgia chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists, and belongs to the Association of Health Care Journalists.
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