NEW YORK—Bob Culley, a professional lighting designer at the David Koch Theater, was right at home enjoying the Shen Yun performance on March 19 at Lincoln Center. He was accompanied by Carolina Napolitano, a microbiologist, who said they had been wanting to see the show for two years.
With his professional background, Mr. Culley noted the quality of the production. “It’s a beautiful production; they really captured the storytelling with the lighting, the projections, and the backdrop. They did a very good job.”
Mr. Culley said Shen Yun brought a hint of the new season. “It’s very uplifting, especially that [the feeling that] spring is coming. I feel that all the colors, the sounds, and the dance has brought us to the beginning of a new spring.”
Ms. Napolitano agreed but with a touch of sadness. “For me, it’s very sad, too. I mean, it’s a beautiful show and I love the colors and that spring is coming, but I’m sad that this is what China once was—then went communist.”
Mr. Culley noted the high production values. “They’re very artistic in their use of the lighting; they’re very dramatic in their backdrops and storytelling and in the audio-visual department. They really move the show to the point where you’re wrapped up in the story.”
“And they create a very beautiful vision,” Ms. Napolitano said.
Ballet Instructor Wants to Share the Experience With Students
Arina Clavel, who teaches at the Russian Ballet Academy in the United States, especially noticed the entire Shen Yun presentation and staging of the dances: the choreography, how the dances pieces were introduced by emcees, the costumes, and the performers’ professionalism. “It’s something you don’t see every day,” she said.
She noted how the projected image on the backdrop worked with the orchestra and dancers’ movements and said that she would talk about Shen Yun with her students and describe the experience of seeing the performance, in hopes that they would be inspired as well.
Shen Yun’s combination of classical Chinese dance, a live orchestra, and the revival of Chinese culture makes it a performance, unlike any other production. The company is able to fulfill its mission of reviving 5,000 years of Chinese culture since it is based in New York and not in mainland China, where it is censored. The communist regime has a long history of suppressing and dismantling the country’s traditional culture, and thus forbids Shen Yun from performing in China.
Reported by Dongyu Teng, Weiyong Zhu and Yvonne Marcotte.
The Epoch Times is a proud sponsor of Shen Yun Performing Arts. We have covered audience reactions since Shen Yun’s inception in 2006.
